[no subject]

See http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt#element-param

As an alternative, you may want to use

<xsl:variable name="permission" select="''"/>

And test later on if the string is empty or not.

HTH,
<prs/>

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Koberg [mailto:rob@xxxxxxxxxx] 
Sent: Thursday, September 30, 2004 3:16 PM
To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject:  top level xsl:param confusion

Hi,


I have a top level param like so:

<xsl:param name="permission" select="false()"/>


Main Question:

Is the above top level xsl:param considered false even if it was passed an
empty string? I would expect it to be false only if the param was
*not* passed.


More info:

I send the param down to the transformation if a user has access to the
filesystem otherwise it is not sent. And if they have access I send the path
that they are restricted to as the value. Some example values are:

"" -- full project access
"foo" -- access restricted to the 'foo' folder "foo/bar" -- access
restricted to the 'foo/bar' folder

If they have no restriction I want the param value to be 'false()'

The problem (or my misunderstanding) is when I pass down the empty string
value - "". So the transformation sees there is a
/xsl:stylesheet/xsl:param[@name='permission'] - so it should not evaluate to
false(), right? However, it does in both Xalan and Saxon (the only two I
tried). I don't see anything in the spec that addresses this.

For example, the following chooses the otherwise when the param is sent to
the transformation as an empty string.

<xsl:choose>
   <!--<xsl:when test="boolean($permission)"> or -->
   <xsl:when test="$permission">
<!-- allow access -->
   </xsl:when>
   <xsl:otherwise>
<!-- no access -->
   </xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>

thanks for any clarification,
-Rob