Advice sought about combining css testing with databasing of code variables

[David Southwell]

Hi

This is my first posting to this list which I joined for the following
reasons.

1.  I understand that those with substantial experience of css can be found
here.
2. The focus of the list is upon css testing.
3. I am thinking of embarking upon a project which
   (a) needs to validate existing css code and having done so
   (b) can then extract css code variables, the snippet of code that contains
each variable and then index the variables and the snippets and store the
extracted data in a mysql database.
4. I am in serious need of advice and guidance about tools that could help me
achieve these goals.

It occurs to me that any tool capable of parsing css may also be capable of
extracting snippets and identifying variables. The question for me is what
tools might provide a good starting point.

May I thank you in advance for your replies

David Southwell

[fantasai]

David Southwell wrote:

> Hi
>
> This is my first posting to this list which I joined for the following
> reasons.
>
> 1.  I understand that those with substantial experience of css can be found
> here.
> 2. The focus of the list is upon css testing.
> 3. I am thinking of embarking upon a project which
>    (a) needs to validate existing css code and having done so
>    (b) can then extract css code variables, the snippet of code that contains
> each variable and then index the variables and the snippets and store the
> extracted data in a mysql database.
> 4. I am in serious need of advice and guidance about tools that could help me
> achieve these goals.
>
> It occurs to me that any tool capable of parsing css may also be capable of
> extracting snippets and identifying variables. The question for me is what
> tools might provide a good starting point.
>
> May I thank you in advance for your replies

CSS doesn't have variables currently, so I'm not sure what you're trying to do.

~fantasai

[David Southwell]

> David Southwell wrote:
> > Hi
> >
> > This is my first posting to this list which I joined for the following
> > reasons.
> >
> > 1.  I understand that those with substantial experience of css can be
> > found here.
> > 2. The focus of the list is upon css testing.
> > 3. I am thinking of embarking upon a project which
> >    (a) needs to validate existing css code and having done so
> >    (b) can then extract css code variables, the snippet of code that
> > contains each variable and then index the variables and the snippets and
> > store the extracted data in a mysql database.
> > 4. I am in serious need of advice and guidance about tools that could
> > help me achieve these goals.
> >
> > It occurs to me that any tool capable of parsing css may also be capable
> > of extracting snippets and identifying variables. The question for me is
> > what tools might provide a good starting point.
> >
> > May I thank you in advance for your replies
>
> CSS doesn't have variables currently, so I'm not sure what you're trying to
>  do.
>
> ~fantasai
>

Sorry

I should have used the term value.

e.g. a color code is a value which really needs to be a variable!!! So I
suppose I am trying to find a way around the variables limitation of css which
IMHO is its greatest weakness.

What I want to do is to use a parser to identify "values" in a css file.
Replace those values witha placeholder e.g $my_color to generate an enhanced
.css file [.ecss] . Then create a ecss file configuration utility which
enables an adminstrator to write
$my_color = "red"
in a  configuration file Subsequentlt a .css file is generated by repplacing
the placeholders with the desired value from the configuration file.

David