Re: Variable names *as* variables

[Paul Tchistopolskii <paul at qub dot com>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: John E. Simpson <simpson@polaris.net>

1. Yes, to make your solution work you need saxon:evaluate.

2. What you really want is a lookup, right? So a bit 'softer' solution 
is to do that with node-set extension function ( which is supported
by many engines, but is still *not* W3C standard. This node-set
is a rudiment of mythical "Result Tree Fragment is not a node-set".

<xsl:stylesheet 
 xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" 
        xmlns:xt="http://www.jclark.com/xt"
 version="1.0">

<xsl:variable name="loc">location1</xsl:variable>

<xsl:variable name="lookup">
<location1> some thing 1 </location1>
<location2> some thing 2 </location2>
</xsl:variable>

<xsl:template match="/">

<xsl:value-of select="xt:node-set($lookup)/node()[name()=$loc]"/>

</xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>


3. Plain and 100% conformant XSLT solution requires placing 
the lookup  

<location1> some thing 1 </location1>
<location2> some thing 2 </location2>

into standalone XML document and then reading this lookup into 
the variable with document() ( the document provides the nodeset, 
so you don't need xt:node-set conversion ).

Rgds.Paul.


> I have a feeling that what I'm trying to do can't be done without 
> extensions, like Saxon's eval. Unfortunately I can't use an extension 
> function for this case, and thought I'd fly it past the list to see if any 
> of you have a brainstorm.
> 
> Sample XML:
> <someroot>
>    <event date="2000-10-11">
>      <locale place="location1"/>
>      <locale place="location2"/>
>      <locale place="location3"/>
>    </even>
>    <event date="2000-10_12">
>      <locale place="location1"/>
>      <locale place="location3"/>
>    </even>
> </someroot>
> 
> If I want to display literal text (e.g. "Midtown" for place="location1"), I 
> could of course use an xsl:choose block, with an xsl:when for each of the 
> valid values of the place attribute. What I'd like to do instead (for 
> maintainability, whatever) is set up global variables to be used in place 
> of the values of the place attributes. Something like:
> 
> <xsl:variable name="location1">Midtown</xsl:variable>
> <xsl:variable name="location2">Greater Northeast</xsl:variable>
> <xsl:variable name="location3">Dallas-Ft. Worth</xsl:variable>
> 
> Then in the template (so goes the theory) I'd just need to do something like:
> 
>    <xsl:value-of select="concat('$', @place)"/>
> 
> But -- duh -- all this does is produce the *string* "$location1," 
> "$location2," and "$location3."
> 
> Any ideas? Can't be done with straight XSLT, right?



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