Name

position()

Returns the position of the context item within the sequence of items currently being processed.

Syntax

[1.0] number position()
[2.0] xs:integer position()

Inputs

None.

Output

A number equal to the position of the current node in the sequence of items currently being processed. For example, if the current node is the fifth <li> being processed, position() returns 5.

Defined in

[1.0] XPath section 4.1, “Node Set Functions.”

[2.0] XQuery 1.0 and XPath 2.0 Functions and Operators section 16, “Context Functions.”

Examples

This example uses the position() function to create a style attribute for the cells of an HTML table. The background colors cycle through the options black, gray, and white, while the foreground colors cycle through white, white, and black. Here’s the XML document we’ll use:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!-- albums.xml -->
<list xml:lang="en">
  <title>Albums I've bought recently:</title>
  <listitem>The Sacred Art of Dub</listitem>
  <listitem>Only the Poor Man Feel It</listitem>
  <listitem>Excitable Boy</listitem>
  <listitem xml:lang="sw">Aki Special</listitem>
  <listitem xml:lang="en-gb">Combat Rock</listitem>
  <listitem xml:lang="zu">Talking Timbuktu</listitem>
  <listitem xml:lang="jz">The Birth of the Cool</listitem>
</list>

We’ll use this stylesheet to generate our HTML document:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!-- position.xsl --> <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"> <xsl:output method="html"/> <xsl:template match="/"> <html> <head> <title> ...

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