[xsl] Effecient element "filtering" technique recommendations.

Subject: [xsl] Effecient element "filtering" technique recommendations.
From: "Edward L. Knoll" <ed.knoll@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 07 Oct 2002 08:15:41 -0600
We have some XML which effectively represents the contents of a table. 
Each row from the table is an element; each column in a row is a
subelement within the row.  The XML we generate for the table could
contain more columns than we actually want to process/display.

I have another element which identifies all of the columns to be
processed/displayed.  The subelements of this element have the same
names as the row columns.  

I'm looking for recommendations on ways in which we can only process the
row columns which correspond to the other columns.  My current approach
is adding approximately 40% onto our total XSL processing time.  I've
included XML examples and (simplified versions) of the templates with
and without the filtering.

XML::

<Table>
  <Columns>
    <Column1/>
    <Column2/>
    <Column4/>
  </Columns>

  <Row>
    <Column1>...</Column1>
    <Column2>...</Column2>
    <Column3>...</Column3>
    <Column4>...</Column4>
    <Column5>...</Column5>
  </Row>

  <Row>
    <Column1>...</Column1>
    <Column2>...</Column2>
    <Column3>...</Column3>
    <Column4>...</Column4>
    <Column5>...</Column5>
  </Row>

  ...
</Table>


XSL (fragments) w/o filtering::

<xsl:variable name="TableColumns" select="/Table/Columns/*" />

<xsl:template  select="/Table/Row">
   <xsl:apply-templates select="*" mode="ColumnContent" />
</xsl:template>


XSL (fragments) w/ filtering::

<xsl:variable name="TableColumns" select="/Table/Columns/*" />

<xsl:template  select="/Table/Row">
   <xsl:for-each select="*">
      <xsl:variable name="MyName" select="name()" />
      <xsl:if test="$TableColumns[name()=$MyName]" >
         <xsl:apply-templates select="." mode="ColumnContent" />
      </xsl:if>
   </xsl:for-each>
</xsl:template>


Thanks in advance,
Ed Knoll

-- 
Edward L. Knoll   Phone (work)     : (719)484-2717
                  e-mail (work)    : ed.knoll@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
                  e-mail (business): eknoll@xxxxxxxxxx
                  e-mail (personal): edward@xxxxxxxxxxx

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