The document element

About

The document element is the root element in a content file and configuration file.

What you can do

You can do the following tasks on the document element:

The tasks you can do depends on your user role.

Working with attributes

You can add metadata to the document element to distinguish it from other document elements. You might, for example, want to style the content of a specific document element differently compared to other document elements.

To add metadata, you add a value for an XML attribute, such as the class or type attribute.

The available XML attributes in Skribenta are class, type, label, id, condition, xml:lang, data-emoji and data.

Classifying the document element

You can add a value to the class attribute to specify what purpose an element has. Furthermore, you can, for example, set the class attribute value to spare-part-list for a table to say that the table contains spare part components.

A number of elements in Skribenta has a value for the class attribute when you create them. For example, the wrapper element.

class = note: Makes a note wrapper containing information that is important to highlight.
class = warning: Makes a warning wrapper to inform about dangerous aspects of handling a product.
class = figure: Makes a figure wrapper often containing an image with a title.

Skribenta can be configured to let you select attribute values from a predefined list, which can be specific for a given element.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Classifying content

Typing the document element

Various values can be added to the type attribute for an element to specify that it belongs to a specific type.

A specific type on, for example, a table element allows to style the table differently in a PDF compared to other tables. For example, setting the attribute type to Big is a common way to allow a table span across side margins in a PDF to make the table bigger.

The type attribute can have one or more values. The type attribute is often used in conjunction to the class attribute to specify different types of element of the same class.

Skribenta can be configured to let you select attribute values from a predefined list, which can be specific for a given element.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Typing content

Labelling the document element

You can put a label on an element to make the content of the element, for example, context-sensitive (the behavior depends on the style sheet). To label the element, you set a value for the label attribute on the Attributes > Label tab.

Making the document element unique

It is possible to make an element uniquely identifiable in the content file or configuration file. An element ID is represented by a unique value for the id attribute on the element.

An element ID is unique since several elements in the same content file or configuration file cannot have the same element ID.

To make a link to another target element, the target element must have an element ID.

The first character in the element ID must be a letter or an underscore.

It is possible to let Skribenta generate element IDs automatically on certain elements (maintitle, section, table, figure wrapper and block wrapper), in content files and configuration files.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Setting an element ID to make an element unique

Topic: Enabling and disabling automatic element IDs

Conditionalizing the document element

It is possible to conditionalize an element, and thereby all the content in the element, by adding a Condition attribute to the element.

By using a variable in the condition, the condition can be evaluated differently depending on the variable value defined in the publication's configuration file. You can then use the same content file in multiple publications, and let the variable value control the published output.

Setting a condition on the include element is not recommended. Instead, set the condition on the included file's maintitle if the condition applies to all places the file is included. If the condition do not apply for all the different places an included file is reused, wrap the include element in an if-wrapper element.

Setting language on the document element

You can set an explicit language on elements containing content written on another language compared to the language in the rest of the content file.

Content in elements having a set language are ignored when translating. Thus, when publishing translations, the content in elements having a set language is always kept as is.

Select the explicit language for the element on the Attributes > Language tab.

Adding an icon on the document element

You can add an icon on an element to make it visually stand out in your content file to, for example, locate it easily when editing many elements.

Select an icon for the element on the Attributes > Icons tab.

Setting a user-specific attribute value on the document element

You can add custom metadata to an element to process it in some specific way. Apart from the standard XML attributes in Skribenta, it is possible to set user-specific attribute values using the data attribute.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Setting user-specific attribute values

Viewing all attribute values set on the document element

On the document toolbar, click Attributes > All to display the list of all attribute values on the document element.

Deleting an attribute value set on the document element

It is possible to delete an attribute from an element in your file.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Deleting an attribute

Activating and deactivating automatic ID generation

It is possible to let Skribenta generate element IDs automatically on certain elements (maintitle, section, table, figure wrapper and block wrapper), in content files and configuration files.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Enabling and disabling automatic element IDs

Activating and deactivating spellcheck

It is possible to activate and deactivate spell-check for a content file and configuration file. It is also possible to deactivate spell-check for all files.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Activating and deactivating spell-check in a file

Topic: Deactivating spell-check for all files

Activating and deactivating section numbering

Skribenta can automatically number sections in files having the extension .xml. You can turn section numbering on or off.

On the document toolbar, click Options > Sections numbered.

The section numbers are shown in the file, not in the published result.

Adding front matter

It is possible to add a front and end matter to the final published publication. Files are normally divided into three parts, each surrounded by a part element. Each of these elements is further defined by a class attribute.

Front matter (the part element with the class attribute set to frontmatter). This part usually contains a main title and a subtitle. This may be followed by an abstract, release information, etc.
Body (the part element with the class attribute set to body). This part contains the actual content organized into chapters (using the section element).
End matter (the part element with the class attribute set to endmatter). This part contains appendices, references and glossaries.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Adding front matter

Adding end matter

Front matter (the part element with the class attribute set to frontmatter). This part usually contains a main title and a subtitle. This may be followed by an abstract, release information, etc.
Body (the part element with the class attribute set to body). This part contains the actual content organized into chapters (using the section element).
End matter (the part element with the class attribute set to endmatter). This part contains appendices, references and glossaries.

For instructions, see:

Topic: Adding end matter