• Chapter 1: Getting Started with Stylus Studio®
• Chapter 2: Editing and Querying XML
• Chapter 3: Converting Non-XML Files to XML
• Chapter 4: Working with XSLT
• Chapter 5: Creating XSLT Using the XSLT Mapper
• Chapter 6: Debugging Stylesheets
• Chapter 7: Defining XML Schemas
• Chapter 8: Defining Document Type Definitions
• Chapter 9: Writing XPath Expressions
  • About the XPath Processor
  • Using the XPath Query Editor
  • Sample Data for Examples and Practice
  • Getting Started with Queries
  • Specifying the Nodes to Evaluate
    • Understanding XPath Processor Terms
    • Starting at the Context Node
    • About Root Nodes and Document Elements
    • Starting at the Root Node
    • Descending Along Branches
    • Explicitly Specifying the Current Context
    • Specifying Children or Descendants of Parent Nodes
    • Examples of XPath Expression Results
    • Syntax for Specifying an Axis in a Query
    • Supported Axes
    • Axes That Represent the Whole XML Document
  • Handling Strings and Text
  • Specifying Boolean Expressions and Functions
  • Specifying Number Operations and Functions
  • Comparing Values
  • Finding a Particular Node
  • Obtaining a Union
  • Obtaining Information About a Node or a Node Set
  • Using XPath Expressions in Stylesheets
  • Accessing Other Documents During Query Execution
  • XPath Quick Reference
• Chapter 10: Working with XQuery in Stylus Studio
• Chapter 11: Composing Web Service Calls
• Chapter 12: Working with WSDL Documents
• Chapter 13: Building XML Pipelines
• Chapter 14: Publishing XML Data
• Chapter 15: Integrating with Third-Party File Systems
• Chapter 16: Extending Stylus Studio
• Chapter 17: The Stylus Studio Java API
• Chapter 18: Stylus Studio GUI Reference

Home > Online Product Documentation > Table of Contents > Syntax for Specifying an Axis in a Query

Syntax for Specifying an Axis in a Query

The previous sections provide examples of XPath expression syntax that uses abbreviations. This section introduces you to the axis syntax that many of the abbreviations represent. For a list of XPath abbreviations, see XPath Abbreviations Quick Reference.

You can use axis syntax to specify a location path in a query. An axis specifies the tree relationship between the nodes selected by an expression and the context node. The syntax for specifying an axis in a query is as follows:

The axis names are defined in Supported Axes.

A node test is a simple expression that tests for a specified node type or node name. For example:

XPath 2.0 adds additional tests, such as

In addition, you can follow the node test with any number of filters.