I didn't write this line of code -- it's in a style sheet I'm attempting to comprehend -- so I don't want to change anything until I understand what it's doing. But more to the point, it actually is working 99% of the time. There's just one single case where it's counting something as unique when it shouldn't and I have no idea why,, which is why I'm trying to understand precisely what it is selecting and how. The line I cited:

<xsl:variable name="uniqueTypes" select="ead/archdesc/dsc/descendant::*/container[not(@type=following::*/container/@type)]/@type" />

appears at the very start of the style sheet, at which point yes, there is an element<ead> and yes, it will find something. Hence my first question: what precisely is this selecting and how? I *think* that it is selecting certain @type attributes from various<container> elements but I'm not sure which ones, or how it knows that they're unique.

The variable $uniqueTypes is then used later at various places in the code, for example:

<xsl:for-each select="$uniqueTypes">

Hence my second question, whether $uniqueTypes is the same no matter where it gets used later.

	Martin Honnen --- MVP Data Platform Development
	http://msmvps.com/blogs/martin_honnen/