Unfortunately, I still don't grok the difference between:

> Unfortunately, I still don't grok the difference between:
> 
> 	*
> 	.
> 	node()


Part of your problem is that you are using xsl:value-of rather than
xsl:copy-of, value-of always gives teh _string value_ of its argument,
so you never see the difference between an element and a text node
using value-of

Consider an input of

<a>www
  <b>zzz</b>
  <!-- yyy -->
  <z/>
</a>

and 
<xsl:template match="a">
...
</xsl:template>

then if ... is

<xsl:copy-of select="."/>


You will output a copy of the current node (which is a) a node includes
all children etc so you get

<a>www
  <b>zzz</b>
  <!-- yyy -->
  <z/>
</a>


then if ... is

<xsl:copy-of select="*"/>

then * is short for child::* and selects all child elements so you get

<b>zzz</b><z/>

note, no top level a, no comments and no text nodes, including indentation white space nodes.


then if ... is

<xsl:copy-of select="node()"/>

then node() is short for child::node() which selects all child nodes
(elements, text, comments and processing instructions) and you get

www
  <b>zzz</b>
  <!-- yyy -->
  <z/>


(no top level <a> element, as you only copied children.

David


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