Microsoft XML - Returning Nodes which have 2 or more Child Nodes

Author

Returning Nodes which have 2 or more Child Nodes

Jerry West

2005-02-22, 11:21 pm

<Test>
<Order id="1">
<Key/>
<Key/>
</Order>
<Order id="2">
<Key>
</Order>
</Test>

I want to return any Nodes which have two or more Child Nodes. For example,
in the above XML fragment I want to return all of the Order Nodes which have
two or more Key Nodes. How does one do that?

JW

Bjoern Hoehrmann

2005-02-23, 4:29 am

* Jerry West wrote in microsoft.public.xml:
><Test>
> <Order id="1">
> <Key/>
> <Key/>
> </Order>
> <Order id="2">
> <Key>
> </Order>
></Test>
>
>I want to return any Nodes which have two or more Child Nodes. For example,
>in the above XML fragment I want to return all of the Order Nodes which have
>two or more Key Nodes. How does one do that?

I am not sure what you mean by "return" in this context, but you can
select them using XPath, this would be

//node()[count(node()) >= 2]

Or if you mean elements rather than nodes

//*[count(*) >= 2]

See the MSDN documentation on how to use XPath in your application.
--
Björn Höhrmann · mailto:bjoern@hoehrmann.de · http://bjoern.hoehrmann.de
Weinh. Str. 22 · Telefon: +49(0)621/4309674 · http://www.bjoernsworld.de
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Jerry West

2005-02-23, 4:29 am

Thank you for the reply. I tried the 1st example below but this always
returns an error that states "Unknown Method". The error indicates the
unknown method is: -->count(node<--

I tried changing the statement various ways thinking that the word "node"
should be changed to reflect the Node name in the XML fragment I showed. For
example:

//node()[count(Key()) >= 2]

//Order/()[count(Key()) >= 2]

//node()[count(node(Key)) >= 2]

Everything I tried yields errors. When I looked up the node() statement on
MSDN it always talks about Nodes versus a function. Is the node() statement
in your example a function or the string I should change to match my XML
example?

JW

"Bjoern Hoehrmann" <bjoern@hoehrmann.de> wrote in message
news:424b1b31.244449546@news.bjoern.hoehrmann.de...
>* Jerry West wrote in microsoft.public.xml:
>
> I am not sure what you mean by "return" in this context, but you can
> select them using XPath, this would be
>
> //node()[count(node()) >= 2]
>
> Or if you mean elements rather than nodes
>
> //*[count(*) >= 2]
>
> See the MSDN documentation on how to use XPath in your application.
> --
> Björn Höhrmann · mailto:bjoern@hoehrmann.de · http://bjoern.hoehrmann.de
> Weinh. Str. 22 · Telefon: +49(0)621/4309674 · http://www.bjoernsworld.de
> 68309 Mannheim · PGP Pub. KeyID: 0xA4357E78 · http://www.websitedev.de/

Bjoern Hoehrmann

2005-02-23, 7:18 am

* Jerry West wrote in microsoft.public.xml:
>Thank you for the reply. I tried the 1st example below but this always
>returns an error that states "Unknown Method". The error indicates the
>unknown method is: -->count(node<--

You might be using MSXML 2.x then, you can download MSXML 3.x from MSDN,
or MSXML 4.x in fact.

>I tried changing the statement various ways thinking that the word "node"
>should be changed to reflect the Node name in the XML fragment I showed. For
>example:

No, node() is a functional notation. You can replace it of course, but

>//node()[count(Key()) >= 2]

That would only work if there is a Key() function taking no parameters,

>//Order/()[count(Key()) >= 2]
^^^

That's not legal syntax,

>//node()[count(node(Key)) >= 2]

That's not legal syntax for the node() functional notation either...
If you want to look only for nodes that have two or more "Key" element
children you can use

//node()[count(Key) >= 2]

For all Order elements with two or more Key element children you'd use

//Order[count(Key) >= 2]

The examples in http://www.w3.org/TR/xpath#location-paths might help.
--
Björn Höhrmann · mailto:bjoern@hoehrmann.de · http://bjoern.hoehrmann.de
Weinh. Str. 22 · Telefon: +49(0)621/4309674 · http://www.bjoernsworld.de
68309 Mannheim · PGP Pub. KeyID: 0xA4357E78 · http://www.websitedev.de/