Oh dear, I think you're right. The spec says in effect that whitespace
shouldn't be added where <xsl:strip-space> wouldn't cause it to be
stripped: which is the case when xml:space="preserve" applies. It also
says that it shouldn't be added inside an xsl:text element - a rather
odd provision which seems to special-case the output of stylesheets.

Michael Kay
Software AG
home: Michael.H.Kay@xxxxxxxxxxxx
work: Michael.Kay@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Gunther Schadow [mailto:gunther@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] 
> Sent: 04 February 2003 20:33
> To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: xsl:output/@indent="yes" and *[@xml:space="preserve"]
> 
> 
> Hi,
> 
> suppose I run the following transform (on anything)
> 
> <xsl:transform version="1.0"
>      xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
>    <xsl:output method="xml" indent="yes"/>
>    <xsl:strip-space elements="*"/>
>    <xsl:template match="/">
>      <root>
>        <span xml:space="preserve"><xsl:text>&#xA;</xsl:text></span>
>      </root>
>    </xsl:template>
> </xsl:transform>
> 
> In Saxon this produces the following output
> 
> <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
> <root>
>     <span xml:space="preserve">
> 
>     </span>
> </root>
> 
> however, I submit this is not correct, or at least not what I 
> would expect. If space is to be preserved on the span 
> element, then I would hope that no space is added either. IMO 
> the output should be:
> 
> <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
> <root>
>     <span xml:space="preserve">
> </span>
> </root>
> 
> i.e., there should be a single newline only, even though that 
> somewhat messes up the XML prettyness.
> 
> Is this something that Saxon just happens to get wrong or is 
> this something that the XSLT spec leaves open to 
> interpretation, or does the XSLT spec actually require this 
> behavior? If the latter is true, how can one preserve space 
> precisely on certain elements without having to choose 
> xsl:output/@indent="no"?
> 
> thanks,
> -Gunther
> 
> 
> -- 
> Gunther Schadow, M.D., Ph.D.                    
> gschadow@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Medical Information Scientist      Regenstrief Institute for 
> Health Care
> Adjunct Assistant Professor        Indiana University School 
> of Medicine
> tel:1(317)630-7960                         
> http://aurora.regenstrief.org
> 
> 


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