[xsl] Re: Count leading spaces using xpath expression

[Dimitre Novatchev <dnovatchev@xxxxxxxxx>]

What seems to be simpler:

string-length(substring-before($x, 
                               substring(normalize-space($x), 1, 1)
                               )
              )


=====
Cheers,

Dimitre Novatchev.
http://fxsl.sourceforge.net/ -- the home of FXSL




--- Dimitre Novatchev <dnovatchev@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> --- Grainne Reilly  wrote:
>  
> > Hi,
> > I am looking for a way to count the number of leading spaces in the
> > text of 
> > an element.  I have written the following template which does this:
> > 
> > 	<xsl:template name="countIndent">
> > 		<xsl:param name="str" />
> > 		<xsl:param name="leadingSpaces" select="0"/>
> > 		<xsl:choose>
> > 			<xsl:when test="(string-length($str) != 0) and 
> > (normalize-space(substring($str, 1, 1)) = '' )" >
> > 					<xsl:call-template name="countIndent">
> > 					<xsl:with-param name="str" select="substring($str, 2)" />
> > 					<xsl:with-param name="leadingSpaces" select="$leadingSpaces +
> > 1"/>
> > 				</xsl:call-template>
> > 			</xsl:when>
> > 			<xsl:otherwise>
> > 				<xsl:value-of select="$leadingSpaces" />
> > 			</xsl:otherwise>
> > 		</xsl:choose>
> > 	</xsl:template>
> > 
> > However, I'd like to get this information as an xpath expression
> (so
> > I
> > can 
> > use it in a predicate e.g. /myElement[(indent expression) > 3]). Is
> > this 
> > possible (it would only have to work for spaces, not all
> whitespace)?
> > Thanks for any advice.
> > Grainne.
> 
> Hi Graine,
> 
> Use:
> 
> string-length(
>               substring-before(translate($x, 
>                                          translate($x, ' ', ''), 
>                                          'Z'
>                                           ), 
>                                'Z'
>                                )
>               )
> 
> 
> 
> This is the double translate technique used by Mile Kay sometimes
> ago.
> 
> The inner translate() gets a string of all non-space characters in
> $x.
> The outer translate() replaces the first non-space character in $x
> with
> 'Z'.
> 
> Then we have a string which is the same as the initial one, but the
> first non-space character now is "Z'.
> 
> The rest is easy -- the group of leading spaces is immediately before
> this 'Z', so we can get it using substring-before().
> 
> Then string-length() gives us the length of the group of leading
> spaces.
> 
> So, if we have defined $x to contain '    xyz a b c  ' (four leading
> spaces and three trailing), the above expression is evaluated to:
> 
> 4
> 
> 
> Hope this helped.
> 
> 
> 
> =====
> Cheers,
> 
> Dimitre Novatchev.
> http://fxsl.sourceforge.net/ -- the home of FXSL
> 
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=====
Cheers,

Dimitre Novatchev.
http://fxsl.sourceforge.net/ -- the home of FXSL

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