> I really don't need the <br /> elements. That is the reason for the  
> template rule removing them. But is the switch from <br/> to <br>  
> caused by the output line?

No, your input (and hence your output) must start with a top level
element html in no-namespace so xslt defaults to html output, where the
syntax of empty elements does not use the xml form />. if you want to
generate XML in this case then you need to say explictly 
xsl:output method="xml"
but in that case you might perhaps also put the elements into the xhtml
namespace rather than no-namespace.

David



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