RE: [xsl] Preceding axis conumdrum

["Michael Kay" <mike@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> The expression I am trying to use to select that value is:
> 
> Preceding-sibling::row/cell[@columnHeader='ItemDate'][not(stri
ng-length(
> normalize-space(.))=0)][1]

Try 

(preceding-sibling::row/cell[@columnHeader='ItemDate'][not(string-length(nor
malize-space(.))=0)])[last()]

or more concisely

(preceding-sibling::row/cell[@columnHeader='ItemDate'][normalize-space(.)])[
last()]

The predicate [1] only gives you the last in document order if it's applied
immediately to a reverse axis. You're applying it to the child axis, so what
you asked for is:

for all the preceding-sibling rows
  select the child cells
    that have a columnHeader of "ItemDate"
    that aren't empty
    and if there's more than one such child, select the first

That will potentially select one cell in each row, and if you use this in
xsl:value-of in XSLT 1.0 this will discard all but the first.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/


> 
> Maybe I'm misunderstanding the axis, but I really can't 
> understand why this doesn't work. In this case I seem to get 
> '7 May' rather than what I want '11 May'.  I'm using Saxon8.0 
> to process this.  Have I found a bug?
> 
> 
> 					<row rowNumber="2">
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemCost">0.341</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDuration">40:02</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDestination">National</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemNoDialled">01415871046</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemTime">18:50</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDate">7 May</cell>
> 					</row>
> 					<row rowNumber="3">
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemCost">0.389</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDuration">45:39</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDestination">Local</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemNoDialled">01294272776</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemTime">19.31</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDate">11 May</cell>
> 					</row>
> 					<row rowNumber="4">
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemCost">0.172</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDuration">8:25</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDestination">Local</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemNoDialled">01294217616</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemTime">08:54</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDate"></cell>
> 					</row>
> 					<row rowNumber="5">
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemCost">0.237</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDuration">3:42</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDestination">National Rate Call</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemNoDialled">08706099000</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemTime">13:53</cell>
> 						<cell
> columnHeader="ItemDate"/>
> 					</row>
> 
> Many thanks,
>    Ed