XSLT string substituion

Hello experts,

I need to use XSLT for a part of a project and have very little
experience with its syntax. The problem is to replace text strings in
this soruce xml file with a value supplied by a variable. For example,
replace temporary-directory="./temp" with
temporary-directory="/var/tmp"  We will use a program that performs the
variable substitution and then calls the XSLT processor to perform the
transform. The program calls XSLT to validate the transformation BEFORE
substituting the variables, so the XLST stylesheet must work with the
variable formats included.  The variables must be in this format:

:[var]

When I substitute variables in this format (:[var}) in the XSLT
stylesheet, the transformation fails with the error:

Prefix must resolve to a namespace.

When I enclose the var in single quotation marks (':[var]'), this
message is displayed:

A node test that matches either NCName:* or QName was expected. [12]

How can I pass this variable syntax in the XSLT stylesheet?

Thanks for your help,


Ann Marie


Source XML file:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE orion-web-app PUBLIC "-//ORACLE//DTD OC4J Web Application
9.04//EN" "http://xmlns.oracle.com/ias/dtds/orion-web-9_04.dtd">
 
<orion-web-app
    deployment-version="9.0.4.0.0"
    temporary-directory="./temp"
    internationalize-resources="false"
    default-mime-type="application/octet-stream" >
    <!-- Uncomment this element to control web application class loader
behavior. -->
<web-app-class-loader search-local-classes-first="true" 
include-war-manifest-class-path="true" />
 
</orion-web-app>


This stylesheet A (without the variable format) works correctly to
replace the text:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
    <xsl:output indent="yes" method="xml"/>
    <xsl:template match="*|@*|text()|comment()">
        <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="*|@*|text()|comment()"/>
        </xsl:copy>
    </xsl:template>
    <xsl:template name="copy-content-no-attrs">
        <xsl:apply-templates
select="processing-instruction()|comment()|*|text()"/>
    </xsl:template>
    <xsl:template match="orion-web-app[@deployment-version]">
        <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:attribute name="deployment-version">9.0.4.1</xsl:attribute>
            <xsl:apply-templates
select="@*[not(name()='deployment-version')]"/>
            <xsl:call-template name="copy-content-no-attrs"/>
        </xsl:copy>
    </xsl:template>
   
    <xsl:template match="web-app-class-loader[@search-local-classes-first]">
        <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:attribute
name="search-local-classes-first">FALSE</xsl:attribute>
            <xsl:apply-templates
select="@*[not(name()='search-local-classes-first')]"/>
            <xsl:call-template name="copy-content-no-attrs"/>
            </xsl:copy>
        </xsl:template>       

</xsl:stylesheet>

This stylesheet B (with the variable format) fails:


<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
    <xsl:output indent="yes" method="xml"/>
    <xsl:template match="*|@*|text()|comment()">
        <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="*|@*|text()|comment()"/>
        </xsl:copy>
    </xsl:template>
    <xsl:template name="copy-content-no-attrs">
        <xsl:apply-templates
select="processing-instruction()|comment()|*|text()"/>
    </xsl:template>
    <xsl:template match="orion-web-app[@:[entryName]]">
        <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:attribute name=":[entryName]">:[value]</xsl:attribute>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@*[not(name()=':[entryName]')]"/>
            <xsl:call-template name="copy-content-no-attrs"/>
        </xsl:copy>
    </xsl:template>
    
    <xsl:template match="web-app-class-loader[@:[entryName]]">
        <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:attribute name=":[entryName]">:[value]</xsl:attribute>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@*[not(name()=':[entryName]')]"/>
            <xsl:call-template name="copy-content-no-attrs"/>
            </xsl:copy>
        </xsl:template>        

</xsl:stylesheet>