Set unions of node sets
Up to now we have determined in each expression only one single node test. But often there are applications where several node tests shall be united.
Example: All titles of the style pop and all labels shall be selected.
//TITLE[@style="Pop"] | //LABELXPath functions
Functions are used for extended operations and queries on node sets and for string analyses of text nodes and attribute values. XPath functions can be used in XPath expressions as well as in predicates, as shown by the following example:
Example: count(//SONG)
//ALBUM[count(SONG)>10]Functions may get an argument and they always return a value! In the first example the "count" function gets a node set as an argument and submits a node set as return value.
Examples for functions on node volumes are:
| local-name(..) | Returns the name of the parent element as a string. |
| //SONG[position()=5] (short notation [5]) | Output of all songs having the fifth position within other songs. |
| //SONG[position()=last()] | Output of all songs having the last position within other songs. |
Examples for string functions are:
| //ALBUM[string-length(TITLE) > 20 ] | Selection of all albums whose title texts have more than 20 characters. |
| //ALBUM[starts-with(INTERPRETER,'M')] | Selection of all albums whose interpreters begin with the letter "M". |
One example for a very often used and powerful function is the general "not()" function. This function negates a Boolean expression. The following example demonstrates the use of this function:
| //ALBUM[not(SONG)] | Selection of all albums which do not contain a song as a direct child. |
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