XML Functions

• Accessor
• Error and Trace
• Numeric
• String
• AnyURI
• Boolean
• Duration/Date/Time
• QName
• Node
• Sequence
• Context

The system-property() function returns the value of the system property specified by the name. System properties in the XSLT namespace:

• xsl:version - The version of XSLT implemented by the processor
• xsl:vendor - The vendor of the XSLT processor
• xsl:vendor-url - The URL identifying the vendor of the XSLT processor

Result: Returns http://example.com/test#toohigh and the string "Error: Price is too high" to the external processing environment

Example: number('100')
Result: 100

Example: abs(3.14)
Result: 3.14

Example: abs(-3.14)
Result: 3.14

Example: ceiling(3.14)
Result: 4

Example: floor(3.14)
Result: 3

The format-number() function is used to convert a number into a string. Here are some of the characters used in the formatting pattern:

• # (Denotes a digit. Example: ####)
• 0 (Denotes leading and following zeros. Example: 0000.00)
• . (The position of the decimal point Example: ###.##)
• , (The group separator for thousands. Example: ###,###.##)
• % (Displays the number as a percentage. Example: ##%)
• ; (Pattern separator. The first pattern will be used for positive numbers and the second for negative numbers)

Example: round(3.14)
Result: 3

Example: round-half-to-even(1.5)
Result: 2

Example: round-half-to-even(2.5)
Result: 2

Example: string(314)
Result: "314"

Example: codepoints-to-string(84, 104, 233, 114, 232, 115, 101)
Result: 'Thérèse'

Example: string-to-codepoints("Thérèse")
Result: 84, 104, 233, 114, 232, 115, 101

Example: compare('ghi', 'ghi')
Result: 0

Example: concat('XPath ','is ','FUN!')
Result: 'XPath is FUN!'

Example: string-join(('We', 'are', 'having', 'fun!'), ' ')
Result: ' We are having fun! '

Example: string-join(('We', 'are', 'having', 'fun!'))
Result: 'Wearehavingfun!'

Example:string-join((), 'sep')
Result: ''

Example: substring('Beatles',1,4)
Result: 'Beat'

Example: substring('Beatles',2)
Result: 'eatles'

Example: string-length('Beatles')
Result: 7

Example: normalize-space(' The   XML ')
Result: 'The XML'

Example: upper-case('The XML')
Result: 'THE XML'

Example: lower-case('The XML')
Result: 'the xml'

Example: translate('12:30','30','45')
Result: '12:45'

Example: translate('12:30','03','54')
Result: '12:45'

Example: translate('12:30','0123','abcd')
Result: 'bc:da'

Example: escape-html-uri("http://example.com/test#car", false())
Result: "http://example.com/test#car"

Example: escape-html-uri ("http://example.com/~bébé", false())
Result: "http://example.com/~b%C3%A9b%C3%A9"

Example: contains('XML','XM')
Result: true

Example: starts-with('XML','X')
Result: true

Example: ends-with('XML','X')
Result: false

Example: substring-before('12/10','/')
Result: '12'

Example: substring-after('12/10','/')
Result: '10'

Example: matches("Merano", "ran")
Result: true

Example: replace("Bella Italia", "l", "*")
Result: 'Be**a Ita*ia'

The unparsed-entity-uri() function returns the URI of an unparsed entity. The name of the entity must match the passed argument. If there is no such entity an empty string is returned.

If the DTD contains the following declaration:

<!ENTITY pic SYSTEM "http://www.w3schools.com/picture.jpg" NDATA JPEG>

the following expression:

unparsed-entity-uri('pic')

will return the URI for the file "picture.jpg".

The element-available() function returns a Boolean value that indicates whether the element specified is supported by the XSLT processor.

The function-available() function returns a Boolean value that indicates whether the function specified is supported by the XSLT processor.

Example: not(true())
Result: false

Example: true()
Result: true

Example: false()
Result: false

Example: year-from-dateTime(xs:dateTime("2005-01-10T12:30-04:10"))
Result: 2005

Example: month-from-dateTime(xs:dateTime("2005-01-10T12:30-04:10"))
Result: 01

Example: day-from-dateTime(xs:dateTime("2005-01-10T12:30-04:10"))
Result: 10

Example: hours-from-dateTime(xs:dateTime("2005-01-10T12:30-04:10"))
Result: 12

Example: minutes-from-dateTime(xs:dateTime("2005-01-10T12:30-04:10"))
Result: 30

Example: seconds-from-dateTime(xs:dateTime("2005-01-10T12:30:00-04:10"))
Result: 0

Example: year-from-date(xs:date("2005-04-23"))
Result: 2005

Example: month-from-date(xs:date("2005-04-23"))
Result: 4

Example: day-from-date(xs:date("2005-04-23"))
Result: 23

Example: hours-from-time(xs:time("10:22:00"))
Result: 10

Example: minutes-from-time(xs:time("10:22:00"))
Result: 22

Example: seconds-from-time(xs:time("10:22:00"))
Result: 0

Returns a node-set that contains only the current node. Usually the current node and the context node are the same.

<xsl:value-of select="current()"/>
is equal to
<xsl:value-of select="."/>

The document() function is used to access nodes in an external XML document. The external XML document must be valid and parsable.

One way to use this function is to look up data in an external document. For example we want to find the Celsius value from a Fahrenheit value and we refer to a document that contains some pre-computed results:

<xsl:value-of select="document('celsius.xml')/celsius/result[@value=$value]"/>

The generate-id() function returns a string value that uniquely identifies a specified node. If the node-set specified is empty, an empty string is returned. If you omit the node-set parameter, it defaults to the current node.

Example: Lang("en") is true for
<p xml:lang="en">...</p>

Example: Lang("de") is false for
<p xml:lang="en">...</p>

Example: index-of ((15, 40, 25, 40, 10), 40)
Result: (2, 4)

Example: index-of (("a", "dog", "and", "a", "duck"), "a")
Result (1, 4)

Example: index-of ((15, 40, 25, 40, 10), 18)
Result: ()

Example: remove(("ab", "cd", "ef"), 0)
Result: ("ab", "cd", "ef")

Example: remove(("ab", "cd", "ef"), 1)
Result: ("cd", "ef")

Example: remove(("ab", "cd", "ef"), 4)
Result: ("ab", "cd", "ef")

Example: empty(remove(("ab", "cd"), 1))
Result: false

Example: exists(remove(("ab"), 1))
Result: false

Example: distinct-values((1, 2, 3, 1, 2))
Result: (1, 2, 3)

Example: insert-before(("ab", "cd"), 0, "gh")
Result: ("gh", "ab", "cd")

Example: insert-before(("ab", "cd"), 1, "gh")
Result: ("gh", "ab", "cd")

Example: insert-before(("ab", "cd"), 2, "gh")
Result: ("ab", "gh", "cd")

Example: insert-before(("ab", "cd"), 5, "gh")
Result: ("ab", "cd", "gh")

Example: reverse(("ab", "cd", "ef"))
Result: ("ef", "cd", "ab")

Example: reverse(("ab"))
Result: ("ab")

Example: subsequence(($item1, $item2, $item3,...), 3)
Result: ($item3, ...)

Example: subsequence(($item1, $item2, $item3, ...), 2, 2)
Result: ($item2, $item3)

Example: avg((1,2,3))
Result: 2

Example: max((1,2,3))
Result: 3

Example: max(('a', 'k'))
Result: 'k'

Example: min((1,2,3))
Result: 1

Example: min(('a', 'k'))
Result: 'a'

Example: //book[position()<=3]
Result: Selects the first three book elements

Example: //book[last()]
Result: Selects the last book element