thanks everyone - i also pulled an example of the *recursive* 
method suggested by Mike from the list archives which I'll
be looking into as some of the fixed widths are 500 chars...

i think Mike should look at "expr" in the Saxon docs...

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:owner-xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of 
> Andrew Welch
> Sent: 18 June 2002 14:49
> To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: RE:  xsl:function
> 
> 
> 
> The syntax is tripping you up again - because its a string you need to
> enclose it in single quotes:
> 
> <xsl:variable name="x"
> 	expr="'&#32;&#32;&#32;&#32;&#32;.....'">
>             ^                              ^
> 
> cheers
> andrew
> 
> 
> 
> this works nicely as
> <xsl:value-of
> select="concat(TITLE,substring('&#32;&#32;&#32;&#32;etc...',
> 							   1, 60 -
> string-length(TITLE)))"/>
> 
> but as
> <xsl:variable name="x"
> 	expr="&#32;&#32;&#32;&#32;&#32;.....">
> <xsl:value-of select="concat(TITLE,substring($x,1, 60 -
> string-length(TITLE)))"/>
> 
> no extra spaces are added.
> do i need to go read Mike's book again?
> 
> >
> > Unless your fixed length fields are really long it's easier to do
> > padding just using
> > concat($theString,substring($x, 1, $fixedLength -
> > string-length($theString)))
> > where $x is a sufficiently long string of space characters.
> >
> > David
> >
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> 
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