Re: processin each element not on a list

Hi Dan,

> I have xml in substantially the following form:
>
> <root>
>  <choices>
>   <choice>A</choice>
>   <choice>B</choice>
>   <choice>C</choice>
>   <choice>D</choice>
>  </choices>
>  <items>
>   <item id="1">A</item>
>   <item id="2">X</item>
>   <item id="3">B</item>
>   <item id="4">C</item>
>   <item id="5">Y</item>
>   <item id="6">Z</item>
>  </item>
> </root>
>
> I need to process each item where its content is not one of the
> choice values. I need a very efficient solution since I have say
> up to 10,000 <items>s and perhaps 100 difference <choice>'s. 

OK, then I think you should set up a key on the choices so that, given
an item value, you can quickly see whether it's on the list of choices
by looking up the key:

<xsl:key name="choices" match="choice" use="." />

Then, in order to select all the items whose content is *not* one of
the choice items, you can find those items that don't return a node
when you use the key to do the lookup:

  /root/items/item[not(key('choices', .))]

Cheers,

Jeni

---
Jeni Tennison
http://www.jenitennison.com/


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