XSLT store xml in an attribute

Question

I have a variable in my xslt that looks like this.

<xsl:variable name="metadata">
    <Metadata>
        <xsl:apply-templates select="..." />
    </Metadata>
</xsl:variable>

Afterwards, I'm trying to add the metadata xml as an xsl:attribute to another node. I tried value-of, copy-of and it didn't work. When using copy-of, I got the error below.

<OtherNode>
    <xsl:attribute name="someAttr">
        <!-- I tried these and neither worked -->
        <xsl:value-of select="$metadata" /> <!-- Empty -->
        <xsl:copy-of  select="$metadata" /> <!-- Error -->
    </xsl:attribute>
</OtherNode>

An item of type 'Element' cannot be constructed within a node of type 'Attribute'.

That's fairly straight forward, but for some reason, I thought it would automatically escape the element.

I'm using xslt 1.0 by the way.

Any ideas?

Thanks

fahed, You may find this answer useful -- it shows how to serialize *any* XML document as an attribute: http://stackoverflow.com/a/11623265/36305 — Dimitre Novatchev, Sep 22 '12 at 02:33

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 21 '12 at 15:30

The first attempt, using value-of, should work with a little mod (using xs:text), but should have returned at least the value of the apply-templates call without the Metadata element. Are you sure the apply-templates select="..." bit is actually finding and returning something?

This works:

<xsl:variable name="metadata">
<xsl:text>&lt;Metadata></xsl:text>
    test
 <xsl:text>&lt;/Metadata></xsl:text>
</xsl:variable>


<xsl:template match="some-element">
  <xsl:element name="some-element">
    <xsl:attribute name="test"><xsl:value-of select="$metadata" /></xsl:attribute>
  </xsl:element>
</xsl:template>

and the output looks like:

 <some-element test="&lt;Metadata&gt;&#xA;        test&#xA;&lt;/Metadata&gt;">

yeah, that's what I ended up doing before I saw your answer. I was hoping I didn't need to do it this way, but oh well. Thanks! — fbhdev, Sep 21 '12 at 15:33
No prob, definitely not a "cool" solution, but sometimes just getting it done is best. Get it done, then move on to the next problem/challenge on the project :) — Jayson Lorenzen, Sep 21 '12 at 17:51

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 21 '12 at 15:33

0

It seems that you have captured more than just text in your variable, but instead have node()or node-set. You need to change your variable to select just the text() that you are looking for.

answered Sep 21 '12 at 15:33

StuartLC

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XSLT store xml in an attribute

2 Answers2