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XPath Abbreviations Quick Reference
Table 104 defines the abbreviations you can use in XPath expressions:
Abbreviation
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Description
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No axis is specified in a location step.
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The child axis is assumed. For example, the following two XPath expressions both return the para children of chapter children of the context node:
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@
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The attribute axis. For example, the following two XPath expressions both return para children of the context node that have type attributes with a value of warning:
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//
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The descendant-or-self axis. For example, the following two XPath expressions both return all para descendants of the context node:
However, it is important to note that the following two expressions are not equivalent:
The first expression selects the first para element that is a descendant of the context node. The second expression selects each para descendant that is the first para child of its parent.
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.
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A single dot is the abbreviation for self::node(). This selects the context node. For example, the following two XPath expressions both return all para descendants of the context node:
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..
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A double dot is the abbreviation for parent::node(). This selects the parent of the context node. For example, the following two XPath expressions both return the title children of the parent of the context node:
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Table 104. XPath Abbreviations Quick Reference
Table 105 shows examples of abbreviations in XPath expressions
Example
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Description
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para
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Selects the para children of the context node
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*
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Selects all element children of the context node
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node_test
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Evaluates all children of the context node and returns those that test true for the particular node_test
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*/para
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Selects all para grandchildren of the context node
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para[1]
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Selects the first para child of the context node
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para[last()]
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Selects the last para child of the context node
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/doc/chapter[5]/section[2]
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Selects the second section of the fifth chapter of the doc child of the context node
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para[@type="warning"]
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Selects para children of the context node that have type attributes with a value of warning |
para[@type="warning"][5]
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Selects the fifth para child of the context node that has a type attribute with a value of warning |
para[5][@type="warning"]
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Selects the fifth para child of the context node if that child has a type attribute with a value of warning |
chapter[title]
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Selects the chapter children of the context node that have one or more title children
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//para
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Selects all para descendants of the document root
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chapter//para
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Selects all para descendants of chapter children of the context node
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//olist/item
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Selects all item elements that have olist parents
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.
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Selects the context node
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.//para
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Selects the para descendants of the context node
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..
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Selects the parent of the context node
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@*
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Selects all attributes of the context node
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@name
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Selects the name attribute of the context node
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../@name
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Selects the name attribute of the parent of the context node
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Table 105. Abbreviations in XPath Expressions
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