xpath question.

[alanchinese]

i wonder if there is a simple xpath query to retrieve a list of book IDs whose note's Descendants evaluates a dynamic condition to be true. to make it simple, consider the following XML.

<BOOKS>

<BOOK ID='1234'>

<CATEGORIES>1,2,9</CATEGORIES>

</BOOK>

<BOOK ID='2333'>

<CATEGORIES>2,7,8</CATEGORIES>

</BOOK>

<BOOK ID='5555'>

<CATEGORIES>1,7,8</CATEGORIES>

</BOOK>

</BOOKS>

 

Dim sRule1 as String = "(contains//CATEGORIES, '2')"

Dim sRule2 as String = "(contains//CATEGORIES, '8')"

when sRule1 is used, IDs '1234', '2333' would be returned.

when sRule2 is used, IDs '2333', '5555' would be returned.

[Igor Sukhov]

Following xpath query returns all Book elements which child CATEGORIES element

contains string "2":

 

"//Book[contains(CATEGORIES/text(), '2')]"

 

i wonder if there is a simple xpath query to retrieve a list of book IDs whose note's Descendants evaluates a dynamic condition to be true. to make it simple, consider the following XML.

<BOOKS>

<BOOK ID='1234'>

<CATEGORIES>1,2,9</CATEGORIES>

</BOOK>

<BOOK ID='2333'>

<CATEGORIES>2,7,8</CATEGORIES>

</BOOK>

<BOOK ID='5555'>

<CATEGORIES>1,7,8</CATEGORIES>

</BOOK>

</BOOKS>

 

Dim sRule1 as String = "(contains//CATEGORIES, '2')"

Dim sRule2 as String = "(contains//CATEGORIES, '8')"

when sRule1 is used, IDs '1234', '2333' would be returned.

when sRule2 is used, IDs '2333', '5555' would be returned.

[alanchinese]

Thankx for the tips!

but I cannot modify the Rules, so rule1 and rule2 cannot be modified to obtain a list of Book elements.

any ways to plug in the rule strings into the xpath?

also, what would the above xpath be if i CATEGORIES is a decendant element instead of a direct child?

again, thankx a lot

 

Following xpath query returns all Book elements which child CATEGORIES element

contains string "2":

 

"//Book[contains(CATEGORIES/text(), '2')]"

[Igor Sukhov]

What do you mean by "rules" ? How do you apply/convert your "rules" to actual XPath expressions ?