[xsl] Re: document()

[Stuart Brown <stuart.brown@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>
> Thanks for your reply!  Do you ( or anybody else) happen to know how to use
> the document() function to get to the root node of the xml file that you're
> applying your stylesheet to?  Or are there better, alternative ways of
> getting your
> xml file root node??

It might not be the most sophisticated solution, but I define a global parameter
docURI, use references to this, and pass the value to the processor at the
command line, thus:

<xsl:transform [blah blah]>
  <xsl:param name="docURI">index.xml</xsl:param><!-- My default -->
  <xsl:template match="foo">
    <xsl:for-each select="document('someOtherDoc.xml')>
    <!-- We move the context into some other doc -->
      <xsl:for-each select="document($docURI)">
      <!-- And here we are back in the original (whatever it is) -->
      </xsl:for-each>
    </xsl:for-each>
  </xsl:template>
</xsl:transform>

Command line (e.g.):  saxon foo.xml bar.xsl docURI="foo.xml"

> Even more confusing,
> he says that  document('') is used to get the root node of the
> stylesheet - what
> would you do with that?  Didn't he mean the root node of the xml file you're
> applying the stylesheet to?

No -- the stylesheet itself.  If there is some static data, for instance US
State name/abbreviation equivalencies to which you will be referring at various
points, you can set up the following kind of system:

<xsl:transform xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform
  xmlns:lookup="lookup-place"
  exclude-result-prefixes="book">

<lookup:us>
  <lookup:state abbr="CA">California</lookup:state>
  <lookup:state abbr="NY">New York</lookup:state>
  ...
</lookup:us>

and then you know you have this information irrespective of the actual file you
are processing, and can get at it anywhere within the style sheet with, for
instance,

<xsl:value-of select="document(' ')//lookup:state[@abbr=$myState]">

Stuart

============
Stuart Brown
Text Encoding Initiative
Oxford, UK


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