David

Thanks very much for these responses.

I wasn't aware of this syntax option:

> <xsl:value-of select="
>
(ancestor::exp-level-1,ancestor::misc-level-1,ancestor::reg,,ancestor::law,an
cestor::group,parent::*)[1]/
> (heading[@type ='electronic-only'],heading[@type
='running-head'],heading)[1]"/>

and your thoughts on using tunnel parameters in this situation could
help me avoid more code bloat

> <xsl:apply-templates>
> B <xsl:with-param name="heading" B tunnel="yes" select="(heading[@type
> ='electronic-only'],heading[@type ='running-head'],heading)[1]"/>
> </xsl:apply=templates/>
>
> Then the template that needs the heading needn't mess about with the
> ancestor axis at all, just have
>
> <xsl:template match="abc">
> <xsl:param name="heading" tunnel="yes"/>
> ..
> <xsl:value-of select="$heading"/>

Just these ideas to help slim down my stylesheet drastically will be
really useful as it makes the whole transformation easier to visualise
and work on. I could have introduced more modularisation to keep the
code chunks manageable but that can introduce other complexities I'd
rather avoid unless I really need to use them.

Cheers

Mark