jptxs,

You will alas learn that not all XSLT engines are created equal. I've used Saxon, Xalan (both Java and C versions), MSXSLT and XML::LibXSLT, and found XPATH instructions that only one could or could not use. I've not used XML::XSLT for a while prefering the faster and I feel more feature complete XML::LibXSLT, but sometimes even this excellent parser dies, where Xalan was able to correctly transform the source.

Some additional nodes:

• Why is Perl so bad with XML?
• XML parser
• which XML module?
• perl/XML development
• XML Examples (and a call for participation)
• Perl XML FAQ

and

• XML::LibXML and XML::LibXSLT are also c based, and very fast - a particular favourite
• XML::DOM if you need a W3C DOM interface
• XML::GDOME if you need a DOM level 2 iterface
• XML::Parser if you want low level access to your XML
• XML::Sablotron another fast c based parser/XSLT engine
• XML::Simple a classic simple interface to XML in Perl
• XML::TreeBuilder a useful yet underused XML tree manipulation module
• XML::Twig another Perlish XML interface

ajt, thanks for all the good pointers. I've read Learning XML over the last few days and switched to XML::LibXSLT. I now see what was happening in my original problem thanks to both of these. Thanks for pointing me at LibXSLT.

We speak the way we breathe. --Fugazi

Well, I guess the perl is fine since no one has said otherwise. That was what I was concerned about. RTFMing on XML is exactly what I'm in the process of doing. So references well appreciated. Guess it's off to read...

We speak the way we breathe. --Fugazi

I didn't think of it until just now but the use of the prepended // also imposes a performance penalty on your code. If you can specify it as a rooted element that's a win.

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