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[XSL-LIST Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message] Re: Manipulating elements depending on the existence o
 At 03:39 PM 3/11/2008, you wrote: My only remaining issue is that the position() count is inaccurate for the problematic "Item" (as it is contained in 2 "Item" elements rather than one, so the count will be 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3 instead of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) but I'm guessing there isn't much I can do about this in XSL? (since position()'s value *is* technically accurate, and I'm actually trying to manipulate it) Two things about this. Many beginners guess incorrectly that position() refers to the position of a node in the source tree. It doesn't: it only refers to the position of the current node (that is, the node being processed) within the current node list (the list of nodes being processed), wherever these may happen to be in the source and however they are being sorted. This often corresponds to the position of a node in the tree, since the order of nodes within node lists frequently corresponds to document order. But not necessarily. As a consequence, position() is probably less useful for numbering things than is often supposed. Incorrect assumptions about what it does lead inevitably to bugs. More generally, XSLT offers quite comprehensive methods for numbering things, especially given the xsl:number instruction, which is highly configurable. Given a clear specification of what you want to count, it's usually possible to count it. If nothing can be done about it in XSL I can probably add a count in .net prior to bulk loading. Something can almost certainly be done about it in XSL; the question is whether it's worth the trouble compared to alternatives. It might well be easy: if you presented a specification, the list would probably oblige with a way to do what you're asking. Cheers, Wendell ====================================================================== Wendell Piez mailto:wapiez@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Mulberry Technologies, Inc. http://www.mulberrytech.com 17 West Jefferson Street Direct Phone: 301/315-9635 Suite 207 Phone: 301/315-9631 Rockville, MD 20850 Fax: 301/315-8285 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Mulberry Technologies: A Consultancy Specializing in SGML and XML ====================================================================== 
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