[xsl] preceding-sibling after sort gives unexpected result

Subject: [xsl] preceding-sibling after sort gives unexpected result
From: Kaine Varley <kaine.varley@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 11 Sep 2003 18:03:26 +0100
Hi,

I am trying to process a document similar to the one below, using the
stylesheet below. My problem is that after I have performed the sort, I
appear to get the preceding sibling in the original document order rather
than in the newly sorted order.

Looking at the results, you can see that for result number 4, I was hoping
to get (a) as my preceding sibling, and not (c), which was the original
document order.

This is an unexpected result, and not at all what I was hoping for. Is this
supposed to happen, or is this just a quirk of MSXML?


Kaine


Source XML:
-----------
<root>
	<parent>
		<child name="a">40</child>
		<child name="b">60</child>
		<child name="c">50</child>
		<child name="d">30</child>
		<child name="e">20</child>
	</parent>
</root>


Stylesheet:
-----------
<xsl:template match="root">
	<results>
		<xsl:apply-templates select="parent"/>
	</results>
</xsl:template>


<xsl:template match="parent">
	<xsl:apply-templates select="child">
		<xsl:sort select="." data-type="number" order="descending"/>
	</xsl:apply-templates>
</xsl:template>


<xsl:template match="child">
	<result number="{position()}">
		<current-child-name>
			<xsl:value-of select="@name"/>
		</current-child-name>
		<current-child-value>
			<xsl:value-of select="."/>
		</current-child-value>
		<preceding-sibling-name>
			<xsl:value-of
select="preceding-sibling::child[1]/@name"/>
		</preceding-sibling-name>
	</result>
</xsl:template>


Result:
-------
<results>
	<result number="1">
		<current-child-name>b</current-child-name>
		<current-child-value>60</current-child-value>
		<preceding-sibling-name>a</preceding-sibling-name>
	</result>
	<result number="2">
		<current-child-name>c</current-child-name>
		<current-child-value>50</current-child-value>
		<preceding-sibling-name>b</preceding-sibling-name>
	</result>
	<result number="3">
		<current-child-name>a</current-child-name>
		<current-child-value>40</current-child-value>
		<preceding-sibling-name/>
	</result>
	<result number="4">
		<current-child-name>d</current-child-name>
		<current-child-value>30</current-child-value>
		<preceding-sibling-name>c</preceding-sibling-name>
	</result>
	<result number="5">
		<current-child-name>e</current-child-name>
		<current-child-value>20</current-child-value>
		<preceding-sibling-name>d</preceding-sibling-name>
	</result>
</results>


Post sort:
----------
<root>
	<parent>
		<child name="b">60</child>
		<child name="c">50</child>
		<child name="a">40</child>
		<child name="d">30</child>
		<child name="e">20</child>
	</parent>
</root>


My system:
----------
XP Professional
IE6 SP2
MSXML4 SP2


SNIP



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