Hi Nicolas,

When you are working with preceding-sibling you are working from the
perspective of a reverse axis so preceding-sibling::*[1] goes backwards
1 position, preceding-sibling::*[2] goes back 2 and so forth...  Some
quick XSLT to showcase this is...

XML:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<foo>
  <bar>1</bar>
  <bar>2</bar>
  <bar>3</bar>
  <bar>4</bar>
  <bar>5</bar>
  <bar>6</bar>
  <bar>7</bar>
  <bar>8</bar>
</foo>

XSLT:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
version="1.0">
<xsl:template match="/">
  <xsl:apply-templates select="foo/bar[8]"/>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template match="bar">
  <xsl:value-of select="preceding-sibling::bar[3]"/>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>

Produces and output of:

5

Hope this helps!

<M:D/>



> -----Original Message-----
> From: Nicolas Pillot [mailto:nicolas.pillot@xxxxxxxxxx]
> Sent: Thursday, May 27, 2004 12:40 PM
> To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject:  Elements just before/after the current one
> 
> 
>   Hello!
> 
>   I have a problem, as you can guess. I am struggling to find the
element
>   that is just before, and the element just after the current one.
> 
>   What i am doing now for the element after the current one is :
>      following-sibling::*[position() = 1]
>   And this seems to work. But for the element just before, i tried
>      following-sibling::*[last()]
>   but this gives me the first (topmost) item instead of the last !
>   So i debugged with :
> 
> 	<xsl:variable name="prevcount">
> 		<xsl:value-of select="count(preceding-sibling::*)" />
> 	</xsl:variable>
> 	<xsl:for-each select="preceding-sibling::*">
> 		<xsl:element name="before">
> 			<xsl:value-of select="."/> <!-- or name() -->
> 			<xsl:value-of select="position()"/>
> 			<xsl:if test="position() = $prevcount">
> 				selected
> 			</xsl:if>
> 		</xsl:element>
> 	</xsl:for-each>
> 
>   And the "selected" text appears right next to the good element.
>   Then i tried the following to sum it up :
> 
> 	<xsl:variable name="prevcount">
> 		<xsl:value-of select="count(preceding-sibling::*)" />
> 	</xsl:variable>
> 	<xsl:value-of select="preceding-sibling::*[position() =
$prevcount]"
> />
> 
>   But again, it give me the content of the first (topmost) node !!
>   What am i doing wrong ?! Is there a simpler way to get these
"special"
> items ?
> 
>   Any help would be greatly appreciated !
>   Nicolas