RE: XPath: better way to check for text nodes that aren't descendents of

[ Lars Huttar]

> But is there a more efficient way to do this?
> Something that checks for llcd:vernac|llcd:gloss along the way,
> instead of going down the descendant axis and then back up the
> ancestor axis (twice)?  Something along the lines of
>   test="./(not(llcd:vernac|llcd:gloss)/)*/text()"
> where * means "0 or more times".
You could use

test='not(.//*[local-name() != "vernac" and local-name() !=
"gloss"]/text()[1]
                | text())'

or

test='count(.//*[local-name() != "vernac" and local-name() !=
"gloss"]/text()[1]
                | text()) > 0'

These might be more efficient because you do not bother to examine
elements that will not cause a false result, and of the ones that are
examined, you only have to look at one text node.

Whatever expression you use, remember to use 

<xsl:strip-space elements='*'/>

Otherwise you will be counting whitespace-only nodes between elements,
which you most likely do not intend.

Cheers,

Tom P

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