EXSLT - set:distinct

Implementer Page: set.distinct.html
Function Package: set.distinct.zip

Function Syntax

node-set set:distinct(node-set)

Template Syntax

<xsl:call-template name="set:distinct">
   <xsl:with-param name="nodes" select="node-set" />
</xsl:call-template>

The set:distinct function returns a subset of the nodes contained in the node-set NS passed as the first argument. Specifically, it selects a node N if there is no node in NS that has the same string value as N, and that precedes N in document order.

The set:distinct template applies templates to these nodes in set:distinct mode. By default, the nodes are copied by this template, so that a result tree fragment consisting of the nodes is returned.

Implementations

The following XSLT processors support set:distinct:

4XSLT, from 4Suite. (version 0.12.0a3)
SAXON from Michael Kay (version 6.3)
jd.xslt from Johannes Döbler (version 1.0.9)
Xalan-J from Apache (version 2.4.D1)

Implementations of set:distinct are available in the following languages:

XSLT Template (by Jeni Tennison)
EXSLT Function (by Jeni Tennison)

Examples

Function

The following example shows how to use the set:distinct function:

Source

<doc>
   <city name="Paris"
         country="France" />
   <city name="Madrid"
         country="Spain" />
   <city name="Vienna"
         country="Austria" />
   <city name="Barcelona"
         country="Spain" />
   <city name="Salzburg"
         country="Austria" />
   <city name="Bonn"
         country="Germany" />
   <city name="Lyon"
         country="France" />
   <city name="Hannover"
         country="Germany" />
   <city name="Calais"
         country="France" />
   <city name="Berlin"
         country="Germany" />
</doc>

Stylesheet

<!--  Test exslt:distinct  -->
<xsl:template match="/">
   <out>
      <all-countries>
:
             <xsl:for-each select="//@country">
            <xsl:value-of select="." />
;
    
         </xsl:for-each>
      </all-countries>
:
        <distinct-countries>
:  
             <xsl:for-each select="set:distinct(//@country)">
            <xsl:value-of select="." />
;
    
         </xsl:for-each>
      </distinct-countries>
   </out>
</xsl:template>

Result

<out xmlns:set="http://exslt.org/sets">
   <all-countries>:
    France;
    Spain;
    Austria;
    Spain;
    Austria;
    Germany;
    France;
    Germany;
    France;
    Germany;
    </all-countries>
:
     <distinct-countries>:  
    France;
    Spain;
    Austria;
    Germany;
    </distinct-countries>
</out>