Re: expression syntax

Thanks guys (incl.George James), but it just keeps failing when I try to
include the translate in the Select expression.

It was fine translating the input parameter into a new variable (as
suggested by George) and now I've cheated by re-speccing the xml file to
have dates without dashes, so it now works as required.

Alan

----- Original Message -----
From: "M. David Peterson" <m.david@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, November 14, 2004 11:16 AM
Subject: Re:  expression syntax


> Hey Alan,
>
> The two things to consider when using a XSLT 1.0 processor (MSXML3 or
> MSXML4 -- both are possibilities as far as what version of MSXML is on
> your system  -- are XSLT 1.0 processors):
>
> - There is no date comparison function.
> - In 1.0 there is type support for the 4 XPath data types - string,
> number, boolean, node-set.
>
> With this in mind your element date value of 2004-11-14 is viewed as a
> string, not a number.  So using &lt; = or > will return no possible
> matches for anything that is not a number.  In your case, given the
> order of your date entities you are in luck as you can simply use the
> translate() function to convert the '-' (dash) to '' (empty string or
> empty space, however you want to term it.  translate(date, '-', '') will
> accomplish this task.  This will then allow a simple type conversion
> from a string to a number by using the number funtion.  The simplest way
> to do this is to wrap the previous translate function inside the number
> function as so:  number(translate(date, '-', ''))
>
> To get the results you are looking for my suggestion would be to take
> the above conversion functions and use them within xsl:apply-templates,
> using the match attribute of a xsl:template element to match the 'date'
> element and make a copy of that particular nodes contents.  So something
> like this:
>
> <xsl:param name="date" select="'20041114'"/>
> <!-- NOTE: by using param instead of variable you allow yourself the
> ability to pass the value in from outside the template -->
>
> <xsl:template match="/">
>     <dates>
>         <xsl:apply-templates
> select="performance/date[number(translate(., '-', '')) &gt;= $today]"/>
>     </dates>
> </xsl:template>
>
> <xsl:template match="date">
>     <xsl:copy-of select="."/>
> </xsl:template>
>
> Should be much more effective for you in gaining access to the nodes
> that match your number based comparison.  NOTE: Something to keep in
> mind...  The translate function above will only make a copy of the
> string contained within the date element and use that for comparison.
> The actual value will retain its original '-' delimited string version.
> The matching template will make a copy of each matching element from the
> specified criteria (complete copy of the element, its attributes (if
> any), and its value).  So don't be surprised to see the dashes still in
> place when looking at your output.
>
> Hope this helps!
>
> <M:D/>
>
> Alan Divorty wrote:
>
> >I am trying to compare two dates, one in the xml data against an external
> >parameter holding today's date.
> >
> >The format of each is yyyy-mm-dd
> >
> ><xsl:for-each select="performance[date = $today]">
> >
> >successfully processes records with today's date.  However, I want to
select
> >all records equal to or later than today, but
> >
> ><xsl:for-each select="performance[date &gt;= $today]">  does not select
any
> >records.
> >
> >Is my syntax wrong?
> >
> >I'm using IE6 to process the files.
> >
> >Thanks,
> >Alan