RE: template name in attributes

<xsl:template match="login">
   ...
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="t_news">
   ...
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="t_threads">
   ...
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="left">
    <xsl:for-each select="box">
        <xsl:apply-templates match="@name"/>
    </xsl:for-each>
</xsl:template>

Date: Mon, 30 May 2005 22:34:19 +0000
To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
From: "Aron Bock" <aronbock@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: RE:  template name in attributes
Message-ID: <BAY107-F924574AE1D8761ECAFB21D8030@xxxxxxx>

i have the xml:

<left>
    <box name="login"/>
    <box name="quicksearch"/>
    <box name="t_news"/>
    <box name="t_threads"/>
</left>

and the xsl:

<xsl:template match="left">
    <xsl:for-each select="box">
        <xsl:apply-templates select="@name"/>
    </xsl:for-each>
</xsl:template>

This much is kosher.

<xsl:template match="quicksearch">
   ...
</xsl:template>

This, however, doesn't work as expected because the value of the match attribute should [usually] be the name of the matched element or attribute, not their values. Thus, it would something like:

match="@name"

or

match="@name[. = 'quicksearch']"

The "usually" above is because it's possible to match using non name-specific expressions: node() to match any node, text() for text nodes, @* for attributes, etc.

why is the output only the value of the attribute not the template that
matches the value of the attribute?

So now we know why the template doesn't fire. The "value of the attribute" is being output because XSLT has default, behind-the-scenes templates that automatically output certain nodes, if not overridden. Thus, if you left things as they were, then add the following template, you wouldn't get even the attribute value output:

<xsl:template match="@*"/>

Regards,

--A