XSLT: replacing a node by equivalent node of other document

Question

I want to replace some nodes of an XML file by the equivalent nodes of another XML file. As this wouldn't be challenging enough, I want the ID used for comparision be the value of some child.

The "old" XML looks like:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<Root>
    <Documents>
        <Document id="001">
            <Tags>
                <Tag id="document_id">someIDfilename.pdf</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_type">Type A</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_text">A very important document of course.</Tag>
            <Tags>
        </Document>
        <Document id="018">
            <Tags>
                <Tag id="document_id">someOtherIDfilename.pdf</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_type">Type B</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_text">Another very important document.</Tag>
            <Tags>
        </Document>
    </Documents>
</Root>

The second Docoument shall be replaced by the quivalent of the following XML, whereby the ID that I have to use is the value of document_id (since the "id" of the Document node sometimes is overwritten or altered) :

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<Root>
    <Documents>
        <Document id="014">
            <Tags>
                <Tag id="document_id">someOtherIDfilename.pdf</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_type">Type B</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_text">The oh so important new document text.</Tag>
            <Tags>
        </Document>
    </Documents>
</Root>

The result is expected to look like:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<Root>
    <Documents>
        <Document id="001">
            <Tags>
                <Tag id="document_id">someIDfilename.pdf</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_type">Type A</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_text">A very important document of course.</Tag>
            <Tags>
        </Document>
        <Document id="018">
            <Tags>
                <Tag id="document_id">someOtherIDfilename.pdf</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_type">Type B</Tag>
                <Tag id="document_text">The oh so important new document text.</Tag>
            <Tags>
        </Document>
    </Documents>
</Root>

Q1: is that possible by means of XSLT? Or do I have to use Java / DOM?

Q2: If Q1==yes : can somebody solve that here?

Best! Philipp

Do you use an XSLT 1.0 or 2.0 processor? And why is the `id` attribute in the wanted result `018` and not `014`, which is the one from the second document where you said you want to take the replacement from? — Martin Honnen, Mar 26 '14 at 17:10
Currently I'm only allowed to use a XSLT 1.0 processor. The old id attribute would be prefereable for reasons of further processing. — user3465206, Mar 27 '14 at 08:46

Martin Honnen · Accepted Answer · 2014-03-26T17:48:01.487

Using an XSLT 2.0 processor like Saxon 9:

<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"
exclude-result-prefixes="xs"
version="2.0">

<xsl:param name="doc2-url" select="'test2014032603.xml'"/>
<xsl:variable name="doc2" select="doc($doc2-url)"/>

<xsl:key name="id" match="Document" use="Tags/Tag[@id = 'document_id']"/>

<xsl:template match="@* | node()">
  <xsl:copy>
    <xsl:apply-templates select="@* , node()"/>
  </xsl:copy>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="Document[key('id', Tags/Tag[@id = 'document_id'], $doc2)]">
  <xsl:copy>
    <xsl:copy-of select="@id, key('id', Tags/Tag[@id = 'document_id'], $doc2)/node()"/>
  </xsl:copy>
</xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>

With XSLT 1.0 it is also possible but to switch contexts between documents for the key use the code ends up being convoluted:

<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
  version="1.0">

<xsl:param name="doc2-url" select="'test2014032603.xml'"/>
<xsl:variable name="doc2" select="document($doc2-url)"/>

<xsl:key name="id" match="Document" use="Tags/Tag[@id = 'document_id']"/>

<xsl:template match="@* | node()" name="identity">
  <xsl:copy>
    <xsl:apply-templates select="@* | node()"/>
  </xsl:copy>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="Document[Tags/Tag[@id = 'document_id']]">
  <xsl:variable name="this" select="."/>
  <xsl:for-each select="$doc2">
    <xsl:choose>
      <xsl:when test="key('id', $this/Tags/Tag[@id = 'document_id'])">
        <xsl:for-each select="key('id', $this/Tags/Tag[@id = 'document_id'])">
          <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:copy-of select="$this/@id"/>
            <xsl:copy-of select="node()"/>            
          </xsl:copy>
        </xsl:for-each>
      </xsl:when>
      <xsl:otherwise>
        <xsl:copy-of select="$this"/>
      </xsl:otherwise>
    </xsl:choose>
  </xsl:for-each>
</xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>

XSLT: replacing a node by equivalent node of other document

1 Answers1