Re: [xsl] value-of w/separator and nodes

[Abel Braaksma <abel.online@xxxxxxxxx>]

Michael Kay wrote:
> If you read the rules for value-of, you'll see that adjacent text nodes in
> the sequence are concatenated first, before inserting the separator. So if
> you have a sequence of text nodes, no separator is inserted. It's important
> here to understand the subtle distinction between text nodes and strings.
>
> The difference is necessary to ensure that you get the expected and
> traditional result from something like
>   

I must have missed it. I see it now, and it is quite clear indeed, 
quote: "separators are never inserted between adjacent text nodes." and, 
in the same example: "the content is supplied as a sequence of five text 
nodes, which are concatenated without space separation.".

Somehow, I found the following logic logical: take a list of items, each 
item has a type T. Concatenate all items by casting each type T to a 
string, append the separator and append to each other.

Instead, there are two rules. If type T is of a non-atomic type, there 
is no separator at all (I'd prefer the default separator to be the empty 
string, as is explained for the sequence constructor of the value-of 
instruction, making it possible to override this behavior, now I must 
resort to tedious concat()). If type T is of an atomic type, the above 
rule applies.

The subtleties of the language are what makes a language a language. But 
the subtleties are often hard to grasp or to sink in.

Thanks,
Abel