Re: [xsl] Shorthand.

[Abel Braaksma <abel.online@xxxxxxxxx>]

Steve wrote:
> Hey there, I have a template for creating ajax links:
>
> <xsl:template name="a">
>     <xsl:with-param name="href" />
>     <xsl:with-param name="text" />
>     <a href="{$href}" onClick="showData('{$href}');return
> false;"><xsl:value-of select="$text" /></a>
> </xsl:template>
>
> is there some shorter way to use this (XSL 1.0) template than...
>
> <xsl:call-template name="a">
>   <xs:param name="href" select="'x'"/>
>   <xs:param name="text" select="'y'"/>
> </xsl:call-template> 
It depends. You may not need a named template at all. Or you can use the 
context node if you like, or you pass the context node, on in one of the 
parameters, which may make things shorter. In XSLT 2.0 things get even 
easier, where you can define functions.

If you use this browser based, you cannot rely on EXSLT extensions like 
exslt:function. If you use it server side, you can lookup the 
documentation of your processor whether (and how) it supports 
exslt:function or not.

Translating your above example to a template match, would be (without 
knowing your source, guessing):

<xsl:template match="*[x|y]">
  a href="{y}" onClick="showData('{y}');return
false;"><xsl:value-of select="y" /></a>
</xsl;tempalte>

Using the context node, it would become:

<xsl:call-template name="a" />

with the same structure as the matching template for the template.

Cheers,
-- Abel Braaksma