Duplicating and Editing the Document Element

How to use copy and copy-of to make small edits

Need to add one to every index value in your Xml? Misspell a word--a thousand times over? Never fear, use Xslt to patch it up

Here is some annotated Xslt that shows an easy method to copy most information in a source document, changing select elements along the way.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet
  version="1.0"
  xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">

  <!--  //    Output will be near identical copy of input Xml   -->
  <xsl:output method="xml" indent="yes"/>


  <!--  //    Match all attributes and nodes that aren't the root node    -->
  <xsl:template match="@* | child::node()">
    <!--  //    Copy the passed element. . .   -->
    <xsl:copy>
      <!--  //    . . .and all of its attributes    -->
      <xsl:copy-of select="@*"/>
      <!--  //    . . .apply appropriate template to all children   -->
      <xsl:apply-templates/>
    </xsl:copy>
  </xsl:template>

  <!--  //    Change these elements in this manner when performing the copy   -->
  <xsl:template match="OrdinalDay">
    <!--  //    We know this element won't have attributes or children to copy    -->
    <xsl:copy>
      <!--  //    Just add one to the value-->
      <xsl:value-of select=". + 1"/>
    </xsl:copy>
  </xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>