[xsl] best practices for using XSLT modes

["Mukul Gandhi gandhi.mukul@xxxxxxxxx" <xsl-list-service@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi all,
   I imagine that, using XSLT modes is useful. I've been trying different
XSLT approaches for solving a class of XML transformation problems.

Below is an example of what I've tried (I present an XML document, two
different XSLT stylesheets [non schema aware] to process the XML document,
and an identical transformation output with both the presented stylesheets):

XML document:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<root>
   <a val="-1"/>
   <a val="-4"/>
   <a val="5"/>
   <a val="3"/>
   <a val="2"/>
</root>

Stylesheet 1:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform";
                         version="3.0">

    <xsl:output method="xml" indent="yes"/>

    <xsl:template match="root">
       <result>
          <xsl:apply-templates select="a[number(@val) gt 0]" mode="gt0"/>
          <xsl:apply-templates select="a[number(@val) lt 0]" mode="lt0"/>
       </result>
    </xsl:template>

    <xsl:template match="a" mode="gt0">
      <val><xsl:value-of select="@val"/>: positive</val>
    </xsl:template>

    <xsl:template match="a" mode="lt0">
      <val><xsl:value-of select="@val"/>: negative</val>
    </xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>

Stylesheet 2:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform";
                         version="3.0">

    <xsl:output method="xml" indent="yes"/>

    <xsl:template match="root">
       <result>
          <xsl:apply-templates select="a[number(@val) gt 0]"/>
          <xsl:apply-templates select="a[number(@val) lt 0]"/>
       </result>
    </xsl:template>

    <xsl:template match="a[number(@val) gt 0]">
      <val><xsl:value-of select="@val"/>: positive</val>
    </xsl:template>

    <xsl:template match="a[number(@val) lt 0]">
      <val><xsl:value-of select="@val"/>: negative</val>
    </xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>

Both of above stylesheets, achieve the same thing and generate following
output:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<result>
   <val>5: positive</val>
   <val>3: positive</val>
   <val>2: positive</val>
   <val>-1: negative</val>
   <val>-4: negative</val>
</result>

The intent of mentioned transformations, is that the result is little
reorganization of the input.

My questions are following,
Which of above mentioned XSLT transformations, is better over the other,
particularly considering the use of modes (conceptually & possibly wrt to
any other factors)?



-- 
Regards,
Mukul Gandhi