[XSL-LIST Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message] XSLT 2.0: On xsl:sequence and xsl:copy-of
In the latest draft of XSLT 2.0 one of the major new additions is the xsl:sequence instruction. Although it is not well-explained, one may conclude from the description that it is used to produce references to nodes as opposed to copies of nodes. I have some observations and questions about xsl:sequence and xsl:copy-of in XSLT 2.0: O1. The name xsl:sequence is not the best possible name for this xslt instruction. Now that everything is a sequence in XPath 2.0, the word sequence has become a buzz word and its overuse (not to say misuse) can only lead to confusion. If the result of this instruction is placing references to nodes in the output, then a more exact name would be one of the following: xsl:reference xsl:add-reference xsl:node-reference O2. xsl:sequence does everything that can be done with xsl:copy-of and these two xslt instructions are mutually redundant. Q1. Is there anything that can be accomplished with xsl:copy-of and which cannot be accomplished by using xsl:sequence? Q2. Is there any compelling reason of keeping xsl:copy-of in the language (apart for compatibility with XSLT 1.0)? Q3. Let's have: <xsl:variable name="v1"> <xsl:sequence select="/"/> </xsl:variable> <xsl:variable name="v2"> <xsl:sequence select="/"/> </xsl:variable> <xsl:copy-of select="$v1 except $v2"/> Should the output of this code be empty or not? If not, what should the output be? ===== Cheers, Dimitre Novatchev. http://fxsl.sourceforge.net/ -- the home of FXSL XSL-List info and archive: http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list
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