The xsl:copy Element

The <xsl:copy> Element

The <xsl:copy> element enables you to copy a node from the source tree to the output tree. Note that this is a shallow copy, however, which does not copy any of the nodes descendents or attributes. This element has one attribute:

  • use-attribute-sets . Specifies the names of attribute sets to be applied to a created element. Set to a whitespace-separated list of QNames . You can use the attribute only when the context node is an element; see Chapter 6 for the details on attribute sets.

This element can contain a template body, which is used only when the node to copy is a root node or an element. Note that using <xsl:copy> does nothing when used on the root node, because the root of the output document is created automatically.

Heres an example; this stylesheet first appeared in Chapter 2, and all it does is copy all elements from the source document to the result document:

Listing 3.9 Element-Copying Stylesheet
 <?xml version="1.0"?>  <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"  xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">      <xsl:output method="xml"/>      <xsl:template match="*">          <xsl:copy>              <xsl:apply-templates/>          </xsl:copy>      </xsl:template>  </xsl:stylesheet> 

However, <xsl:copy> does not copy attributes, so heres the result when this stylesheet is used on planets.xml:

 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>  <PLANETS>      <PLANET>          <NAME>Mercury</NAME>          <MASS>.0553</MASS>          <DAY>58.65</DAY>          <RADIUS>1516</RADIUS>          <DENSITY>.983</DENSITY>          <DISTANCE>43.4</DISTANCE>      </PLANET>      <PLANET>          <NAME>Venus</NAME>          <MASS>.815</MASS>          <DAY>116.75</DAY>          <RADIUS>3716</RADIUS>          <DENSITY>.943</DENSITY>          <DISTANCE>66.8</DISTANCE>      </PLANET>      <PLANET>          <NAME>Earth</NAME>          <MASS>1</MASS>          <DAY>1</DAY>          <RADIUS>2107</RADIUS>          <DENSITY>1</DENSITY>          <DISTANCE>128.4</DISTANCE>      </PLANET>  </PLANETS> 

Copying attributes, too, is a little more difficult, because you have to specifically find a way to apply <xsl:copy> to each elements attributes. That can be done, for example, with <xsl:for-each> , which is shown in Chapter 5:

Listing 3.10 Copying Attributes
 <?xml version="1.0"?>  <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"  xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">      <xsl:output method="xml"/>      <xsl:template match="*">          <xsl:copy>              <xsl:for-each select="@*">                  <xsl:copy/>              </xsl:for-each>              <xsl:apply-templates/>          </xsl:copy>      </xsl:template>  </xsl:stylesheet> 

Heres the resultnote that this time, the attributes are intact:

 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>  <PLANETS>      <PLANET>          <NAME>Mercury</NAME>          <MASS UNITS="(Earth = 1)">.0553</MASS>          <DAY UNITS="days">58.65</DAY>          <RADIUS UNITS="miles">1516</RADIUS>          <DENSITY UNITS="(Earth = 1)">.983</DENSITY>          <DISTANCE UNITS="million miles">43.4</DISTANCE>      </PLANET>      <PLANET>          <NAME>Venus</NAME>          <MASS UNITS="(Earth = 1)">.815</MASS>          <DAY UNITS="days">116.75</DAY>          <RADIUS UNITS="miles">3716</RADIUS>          <DENSITY UNITS="(Earth = 1)">.943</DENSITY>          <DISTANCE UNITS="million miles">66.8</DISTANCE>      </PLANET>      <PLANET>          <NAME>Earth</NAME>          <MASS UNITS="(Earth = 1)">1</MASS>          <DAY UNITS="days">1</DAY>          <RADIUS UNITS="miles">2107</RADIUS>          <DENSITY UNITS="(Earth = 1)">1</DENSITY>          <DISTANCE UNITS="million miles">128.4</DISTANCE>      </PLANET>  </PLANETS> 

However, theres an easier way of making sure that you copy all the children, attributes, and other descendents of nodes: You can use <xsl:copy-of> rather than <xsl:copy> .

Making Deep Copies

Youll see a way of using <xsl:copy> to make a deep copy of a document in Chapter 4, which describes the node function and explains how to call the same template recursively.



Inside XSLT
Inside Xslt
ISBN: B0031W8M4K
EAN: N/A
Year: 2005
Pages: 196

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