XML Schema Quality Checker
IBM's alphaWorks group released a tool called the XML Schema Quality Checker, which checks both the letter of the law and also its spirit, when validating the quality of an XML schema document. For example, it will check all of the enumerated values of an element or type, and make sure they all fit within a given length facet.
This article tells you how you can integrate the SQC into Stylus Studio as one of the Custom Validation Engines
Where Can I Get the Schema Quality Checker?
Click here to get to the main page, and go to "Downloads and demos".
The software comes as a .zip file (at the time of this writing, it's SQC2.2.1.zip at about 3 megabytes). An archived copy of the SQC2.2.1.zip file is also available from our website.
Installing the Schema Quality Checker
- Unpack the .zip file. For our testing purposes, we'll assume you unpack it into
C:\SQC - In Stylus Studio, go to Tools|Options|General|Custom Validation Engines
- Click on the
icon to add a new custom validator - Fill in the entries like this:
Using the Schema Quality Checker
Open any XML Schema file, and click on the 
(Validate Document) icon to drop down the list, and then select the Schema Quality Checker entry.
You will see the Output window appear, and show something like this:
Running custom validation engine Schema Quality Checker...
Initializing Schema Quality Checker. Please wait ...
SchemaQualityChecker has been initialized
PROCESSING c:\u\cd-UBL-1.0\xsd\codelist\UBL-CodeList-ChipCode-1.0.xsd time : 2005-09-07T00:43:46 ...
c:\u\cd-UBL-1.0\xsd\codelist\UBL-CodeList-ChipCode-1.0.xsd (file 1 of 1) now being read ...
NO ERROR
end time = 2005-09-07T00:43:49
Variations on a Theme: WSDL, XForms, and More
The SQC supports several options which modify its behavior. It might be useful to add more than one SQC validation entry, each with different parameters for different situations. For example, the following could be used in the Arguments: field instead of just plain ${FilePath}:
-emb ${FilePath}to tell SQC to also validate embedded schemas-wsdl ${FilePath}to tell SQC to validate embedded schemas in WSDL documents-xform ${FilePath}to tell SQC to validate embedded schemas in XForms
The full list of available options can be seen by just typing SQC at the command line.
Congratulations! You've just added a powerful new tool to your Stylus Studio toolbox.