[xsl] Formatting of numbers, dynamically

["David B. Bitton" <david@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I am current using format-number($node, '#,##0.00') for formatting currency.
We are now implementing foreign currencies into our application.  For every
transaction, I have an element, CurrencyCode, which contains the ISO
currencyCode and an attribute @minor_unit which tells me how many digits
follow the decimal seperator.  My question is how I can dynamically build
the formatting string.

I was reading this morning in the March 2002 issue of MSDN magazine about
how XSLT is a "Functional programming language", and therefore xsl:variable
entities are "not really variables, rather runtime-assigned constants"
because once they are assigned, the values cannot be changed.  So, this lead
me to start thinking about how I could wrap an xsl:for-each with the
xsl:variable element to produce my output.  What I don't know if how to
obtain functionality like:

for(i=0;i<=@minor_unit;i++){ ... };

I do not want to use an enbedded JScript solution because I want the XSL to
be portable (namely between MSXML and Xalan).  So, how would I construct the
@select attribute in the xsl:for-each to just loop a predetermined number of
times?

--

David B. Bitton
david@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
www.codenoevil.com

Diversa ab illis virtute valemus.


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