Re: Deprecation of browser XSLT - SVNIndexXSLT

On 20. 7. 2026 14:01, Timofei Zhakov wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 14, 2026 at 2:52 PM C. Michael Pilato 
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>     On Tue, Jul 14, 2026 at 5:14 AM Thomas Åkesson <[email protected]>
>     wrote:
>
>         Hi,
>
>
>         I was unable to find any discussion on this deprecation of
>         XSLT in the browsers.
>
>
>         https://developer.chrome.com/docs/web-platform/deprecating-xslt
>
>
>         I suspect this deprecation will break the Subversion web ui
>         (folder listing and Collection of Repositories) and the
>         customization point for these UIs (SVNIndexXSLT).
>
>
>         We use this XSLT extensively so I am interested if anyone has
>         experimented with server-side transformation?
>
>
>     This is unfortunate, but hopefully the situation isn't quite as
>     bad as you might think.
>
>     IIRC, the XSLT variant of the mod_dav_svn directory listing
>     feature is entirely optional.  When a GET request arrives aimed at
>     a versioned directory, if SVNIndexXSLT is set, an XML response
>     referencing the template is generated; but otherwise, an HTML
>     response is still generated.  So this deprecation might force
>     admins to turn off the SVNIndexXSLT "flavor", resulting in some
>     ... undecorated directory listings.  But at least I expect the
>     listings will still "work" (for the most basic of definitions of
>     "work").
>
>     It does cause me to wonder though...  Would a SVNIndexCSS feature
>     be interesting -- where we generate that HTML with quite a bit
>     more structure (divs, ids, etc.) and allow folks to point to a CSS
>     file that at least pretties it up?
>
>
> Just to throw it in: I think a built-in reasonably usable web 
> interface would probably be the most wanted feature that we can do in 
> today's reality of Subversion.


I think it would not, it's bad idea and horrible waste of time. Just 
thinking of the authn/authz/security aspect of such a web interface 
makes me shudder. Subversion hosting services exist, with much better 
user interfaces than we could ever hack up given the resources we have. 
If you're thinking of some kind of server-side-generated interactive web 
UI written in C ... yeah, just no. People who want something lightweight 
can use ViewVC or maybe Trac.

The XSLT support happened at a time when there were few alternatives, 
and some of us (i.e., me) thought it would be a nifty idea. I'm still 
embarrassed by it. Just thinking of the wasted lines of code for 
something probably no-one uses, ouch.

-- Brane