[xsl] the count function

["Trevor Nicholls trevor@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <xsl-list-service@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

XSL 2

I've clearly got a fundamental blindspot with the count function.

In a nutshell, I'm trying to figure out how deeply nested a certain
element is.

I'm finding that this construct:

\xA0 \xA0 <xsl:value-of select="my:repeat-string('\xA0 \xA0 ', count(ancestor::li or
ancestor::step))" />

is always producing the same output no matter how many ancestor lists
there are

It turns out that "count(ancestor::li or ancestor::step)" always
evaluates to 1 even when there are no ancestors at all

I've "corrected" my stylesheet so that it uses

\xA0 \xA0 <xsl:value-of select="my:repeat-string('\xA0 \xA0 ', count(ancestor::li) +
count(ancestor::step))" />

which works exactly as I'd expect.

Why doesn't the single count(a or b) give the same result as count(a) +
count(b)?

cheers
T

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