Re: distinguish whether variable holds string or node

2010/6/13 David Carlisle <davidc@xxxxxxxxx>:
> On 13/06/2010 08:51, TW wrote:
>>
>> Is there a way to determine whether a variable holds a string or a
>> node set? Something like:
>
> no in xslt 1 all you can do is a static analysis of all teh places where
> your template is called and see if it is called with the smae type always=
.
>>

So I can at least console myself I wasn't too dumb to find the solution ;-).

>> <xsl:template name=3D"my-template">
>>   <xsl:param name=3D"arg"/>
>
> Note that makes the default value an epty string which is dangerous if the
> value passed in is going to be a node set and you want to do $arg/some/path.
> Safer is to declare it as
> <xsl:param name=3D"arg" select=3D"/.."/>
> so the default value is a (empty) node set and then it is safe to do
> $arg/some/path
> without having to test the type, so long as you always pass in a node set.
>

Thanks for the advice.  I'm not sure what you consider "safe"?  I
would rather want the transformation to fail than to cover possible
flaws (like missing or misspelled template parameters).  Or did I
misunderstand you?

Martin Honnen wrote:
> ESLT has object-type http://www.exslt.org/exsl/functions/object-type/inde=x.html

Yes, but I'd still rather stick to the standard.  If I can't determine
the type, then I'll have to take some other route to get where I want
to get.  To properly learn XSLT I'll probably best learn how to cope
with its limitations as well.

Thanks for your kind help
Thomas W.