CODEWITHSUNDEEP
htmlxmlxslthtml-lists
CJ7
CJ7

Reputation: 23285

How to do XSLT transformation utilising XML comments?

What XSLT will transform the following pattern of XML into the HTML output below?

<ELEMENT1>
  <!--
  Comment for element 2
  -->
  <ELEMENT2>
    <ELEMENT3>ABC</ELEMENT3>
  </ELEMENT2>
  <!--
  Comment for element 4
  -->
  <ELEMENT4>
    <ELEMENT5>0534564117</ELEMENT5>
    <!--
        Comment for element 6
    -->   
    <ELEMENT6>123456</ELEMENT6>
  </ELEMENT4>
</ELEMENT1>

Output:

  • ELEMENT1
    • Comment for Element 2
    • ELEMENT2
      • ELEMENT3
    • Comment for Element 4
    • ELEMENT4
      • ELEMENT5
      • Comment for Element 6
      • ELEMENT6

Upvotes: 0

Views: 439

Answers (2)

Michael Kay
Michael Kay

Reputation: 163458

The thing you may be looking for is the xsl:comment instruction, which creates a comment in the output.

Upvotes: 0

C. M. Sperberg-McQueen
C. M. Sperberg-McQueen

Reputation: 25034

You'll want a stylesheet with three templates. One template matches the document root and emits the outer HTML structure, and recurs as usual on all child nodes. It wraps everything else in an HTML unordered list.

<xsl:template match="/">
  <html>
    <head><title>Demo document</title></head>
    <body>
      <ul>
        <xsl:apply-templates/>
      </ul>
    </body>
  </html>
</xsl:template>

One template handles elements by emitting a list item containing the element type name. If the element has children, it recurs on them, wrapping their output in a nested ul element.

<xsl:template match="*">
  <li>
    <xsl:value-of select="name()"/>
    <xsl:if test="node()">
      <ul>
        <xsl:apply-templates select="node()"/>
      </ul>
    </xsl:if>
  </li>
</xsl:template>

If you don't mind emitting an empty ul element (most browsers don't particularly care), you can do without the xsl:if surrounding the nested ul.

The third template matches comments and emits list items for them, wrapping the content of the comment in an i element.

<xsl:template match="comment()">
  <li><i><xsl:value-of select="."/></i></li>
</xsl:template>

You may also want a template to deal with text nodes, if the default template for text nodes is not acceptable.

Upvotes: 1

Related Questions