Test for empty attributes in XSLT

Testing for missing attributes in XML elements is different from testing for attributes with empty values. You can test for missing attributes with <xsl:if test="not(@attribute)">, but this test will never succeed if the attribute is present but empty. In that case, you have to use the <xsl:if test="@attribute = ''"> condition.

This post is part of You've asked for it series of articles.

4 comments:

  1. Anonymous19 February, 2009 14:13

    then how to you check if the attribute value is not emtpy
    like this maybe

    xsl:if test="@attribute != ''"

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ivan Pepelnjak19 February, 2009 14:55

    Absolutely right.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jason N25 April, 2009 09:45

    Forgive me if I'm wrong, I'm new to xslt but LiquidXml editor does not work with your example above - testing for a missing attribute. This is what I got to work:
    <xsl:if test="not(@attribute)">
    Apparently "not" is a function and needs the parenthesis to work right.

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  4. Ivan Pepelnjak25 April, 2009 09:56

    You're correct. Fixed the post.

    ReplyDelete