Re: Can a match attribute use a non-pattern expression?

[Keith Visco <kvisco@xxxxxxxxx>]

Elliotte,

Axis Identifiers are a part of location paths...

>From Section 6.1

[3] RelativeLocationPath ::= Step | ...

[4] Step = AxisIdentifier '(' NodeTestPredicate ')' | AbbreviatedStep

-Keith

Elliotte Rusty Harold wrote:
> 
> In the latest XSL draft, section 7.2 states:
> 
> The match attribute is a *Pattern* that identifies the source node or
> nodes to which the rule applies.
> 
> According to section 6.3:
> 
> A *Pattern* is set of location path patterns separated by |. A location
> path pattern is a location path none of the steps of which use either
> AxisIdentifiers or . or ... Location path patterns can also start with
> an id() or key() function call with a literal argument (see [6.2.2
> Node-sets]). Predicates in a pattern can use arbitrary expressions just
> like predicates in a location path.
> 
> I'm particularly concerned about that bit about not using Axis
> Identifiers which are defined in production 5 as from-ancestors,
> from-ancestors-or-self, from-attributes, from-children, from-self, etc.
> 
> In other words it seems that section 7.2 says that match attribute must
> use the abbreviated syntax.
> 
> Section 7.3 states that "A select attribute can be used to process nodes
> selected by an expression instead of all children. The value of the
> select attribute is a NodeSetExpr." Thus this restriction only seems to
> aply to match attributes, not to select attributes.
> 
> What's the reasoning behind this?  Why is match restricted to patterns
> while select is not?
> 
> +-----------------------+------------------------+-------------------+
> | Elliotte Rusty Harold | elharo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx | Writer/Programmer |
> +-----------------------+------------------------+-------------------+
> |               Java I/O (O'Reilly & Associates, 1999)               |
> |            http://metalab.unc.edu/javafaq/books/javaio/            |
> |   http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=1565924851/cafeaulaitA/   |
> +----------------------------------+---------------------------------+
> |  Read Cafe au Lait for Java News:  http://metalab.unc.edu/javafaq/ |
> |  Read Cafe con Leche for XML News: http://metalab.unc.edu/xml/     |
> +----------------------------------+---------------------------------+
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