Re: [xsl] XSLT/XPath 2.0 (was "Identifying two tags...")

Subject: Re: [xsl] XSLT/XPath 2.0 (was "Identifying two tags...")
From: Elliotte Rusty Harold <elharo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 14 May 2002 21:56:47 -0400
At 7:48 PM +0100 5/14/02, Francis Norton wrote:

Not sure whether it's possible or not, but I certainly don't like the idea of re-inventing XML Schema data types such as dates in XSLT or XPath.

I like the idea of being able to apply functions that depended on XML Schema data types in the absence of a PSVI, but I would hate to re-invent the data types incompatibly.


That's not necessary at all. Remember, schema or no schema all an XML document really contains is strings. I'm saying the getYear("1999-09-12") function should return the same value regardless of what the schema may say about the type of the string that it's passed. If the schema says that's a date, great! If the schema says it isn't a date, the function works just the same and still returns 1999.


In reverse if I call getYear("Barney") I expect the function to fail or return some error value, regardless of what the schema says about the type of the string I pass it.

You need to remember that a lot of the functions people are asking for that handle dates, numbers, and other types are implemented *today* in EXSLT. We do not need string typing to add these to the language. They work *today* in weakly typed XSLT 1.0. Do not confuse the need for date functions with the much less important need for date types, and similarly for the other schema types.

I am explicitly asking for weak typing in XSLT 2.0.
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