Hi Bernard,

> Amongst the child elements there is a sequence of zero or more "a"
> elements. I need an XPath expression to select/match the first
> element after this sequence of "a" elements(if present). The first
> element's name after the "a" sequence is unknown. In the above
> example it just happens to be "xp"

It depends if you're selecting or matching.  If you're selecting, then
you can say:

go to the z element:

  z

from there go to the a elements:

  z/a

and from there to any immediately following sibling...

  z/a/following-sibling::*[1]

that isn't itself an 'a' element:

  z/a/following-sibling::*[1][not(self::a)]

This will only work in a select expression because match patterns
don't allow following-sibling:: axes.  For a match pattern, you need
something like you have already or one of its equivalents, like:

  z/*[preceding-sibling::a and not(self::a)][1]

or:
  
  z/*[not(self::a)][preceding-sibling::*[1][self::a]]

I hope that helps,

Jeni

---
Jeni Tennison
http://www.jenitennison.com/



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