[xsl] Help moving away from named templates

Subject: [xsl] Help moving away from named templates
From: Steve <subsume@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 2 May 2007 11:18:24 -0400
Hey there,

I'm trying to reorganize my xsl application to make more use of the
template match attribute. I mostly transform XML documents which are
created based on SQL query results. For the time being, my XSL calls a
named template to display this profile. I can think of two
alternatives (illustrated below). If someone has a better one I am all
ears!

Sample XML-------------

<Records>
  <Record>
     <firstName>Steve</firstName>
     <customerID>999</custID>
  </Record>
</Records>

--------------------------------

1) To display their profile I *could* do:

<xsl:apply-templates match="Records/Record/node()[name()='firstName']"/>

and in most cases this would work, but of course this would conflict
with any other customer info that also contained 'firstName' (display
Emergency Contact info, for example, would have a 'firstName' and thus
conflict). I could make it so it checked for more than the firstName,
but this a nightmare in the making. Am I wrong?

2) At the time of XML generation I could include a node indicating
which template needed to be displayed, but while this simplifies XSL
it doesn't seem to simplify program code.

Example:

<Records>
  <template>customerProfile</template>
  <Record>
         <etc />
         <etc />
  </Record>
</Records>

Then do <xsl:apply-templates
match="Records[template='customerProfile']/Record" />

The problem with this solution is that it doesn't seem to reduce
complexity, only to shuffle it away from XSL.

Thanks!

-Steve

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