Oliver Becker wrote:

> Hi Karlo,
> 
> > * Hi, I am trying to do a conditional sort. I want to have a look at an
> > input parameter $arrangeby and if this is of Type DATE then I would like to
> > specify a sorting different from my usual
> > 
> > <xsl:sort select="*[name()=$arrangeby]"/>
> 
> not as easy as you might hope ...
> 
> Jeni Tennisson posted a nice explanation about this. Check out:
> http://www.biglist.com/lists/xsl-list/archives/200102/msg00191.html


This nice explanation illustrates extremely well why we need to use a generic sort
template in this case.

While any use of a generic sort() will be natural, any attempt to use xsl:sort for
cases far from the most trivial -- these will look perverted and totally
incomprehensible to anybody but their author.

This is because xsl:sort needs a sort-key as ***one*** expression to be specified as
the value of its select attribute.

Contrary to this, a generic sort template leaves to the caller-supplied template the
definition of what a sort-key is and how sort-keys should be compared.

Cheers,
Dimitre Novatchev.

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