Does anyone know of a quick and dirty way to collapse a series of
elements which each have only one child?
...
The following stylesheet is close, but not quite there yet.

T:\ftemp>type saverio.xml
<db>
   <a>
      <b>
         <c>
            <d/>
            <e/>
         </c>
      </b>
   </a>

   <f>
      <g>
         <h>
            <i/>
            <j/>
         </h>
      </g>
   </f>
</db>

T:\ftemp>type saverio.xsl
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
                version="1.0">

<xsl:template match="*">
  <xsl:copy>
    <xsl:apply-templates/>
  </xsl:copy>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="*[count(*)=1]"><!--first with one child-->
  <xsl:apply-templates mode="one-child"/>
</xsl:template>

                        <!--child of last one with one child-->
<xsl:template match="*[count(*)!=1]" mode="one-child">
  <xsl:variable name="container-name">
    <xsl:for-each select=".|ancestor::*[count(*)=1]">
      <xsl:if test="position()>1">_</xsl:if>
      <xsl:value-of select="name(.)"/>
    </xsl:for-each>
  </xsl:variable>
  <xsl:element name="{$container-name}">
    <xsl:apply-templates/>
  </xsl:element>
</xsl:template>

T:\ftemp>saxon saverio.xml saverio.xsl
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<db>

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