I'd have to read the spec
in particular, reading
http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt20/#constructing-simple-content
reveals the answer.
<xsl:variable name="foo" as="item()*">
<xsl:text/>abc<xsl:sequence select="'def'"/>
</xsl:variable>
$foo is a sequence of length three.
An empty text node
a text node with string value "abc"
and a string "def"
<xsl:variable name="foo2" as="item()*">
<xsl:text/>abc<xsl:value-of select="'def'"/>
</xsl:variable>
$foo2 is a sequence of length three.
An empty text node
a text node with string value "abc"
and a text node with string value "def"
So what happens when you do
<xsl:value-of select="$foo" separator=","/>
<xsl:value-of select="$foo2" separator=","/>
Well the 6 stages in the above referenced section get applied.
stage 1 is dicarding zero length text nodes so now
$foo is
a text node with string value "abc"
and a string "def"
and $foo2 is
a text node with string value "abc"
and a text node with string value "def"
stage 2 is merging adjacent text nodes so now
$foo is
a text node with string value "abc"
and a string "def"
and $foo2 is
a text node with string value "abcdef"
stage 3 converts from nodes to atomic values so now
$foo is
a string "abc"
and a string "def"
and $foo2 is
a string "abcdef"
stage 5 is concatenating all the sequence together, inserting the
separator if one is supplied or a space if not, so now
$foo is
a string"abc,def"
and $foo2 is
a string"abcdef"
Voila....
David
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