RE: handling failed document() invocations

> 
> The problem is there may not be a document there, which is an 
> OK state of affairs.  What is the xsl code idiom for 
> detecting when document() is unable to find a document at the 
> given location, and to handle this in a more meaningful way 
> than exiting on error?
> 
> If it matters I'm using saxon 6.5.2.
> 

The XSLT 1.0 spec says that the implementation can choose whether to
fail when document() can't find anything, or to recover by returning an
empty node-set. Unfortunately this doesn't really help you write
portable code.

In Saxon you can set the error handling options from the command line:

  -w0 recovers silently from recoverable errors
  -w1 (the default) gives a warning and then recovers
  -w2 gives a fatal error

You can also control it from the API.

This is a global switch that applies to all errors; you could also try
to write a JAXP ErrorListener that handles the specific error.

Another approach is to write your own URIResolver that finds the
document, it can return a dummy document if nothing is found. This is
probably the most portable solution.

Michael Kay
Software AG
home: Michael.H.Kay@xxxxxxxxxxxx
work: Michael.Kay@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 


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