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functx:remove-elements

Removes child elements from an XML node, based on name

Description

The functx:remove-elements function removes child elements from the elements in $elements. The $names argument is a sequence of strings that represent child element names to remove. Prefixes can (and must) be used in the $names values for elements that are prefixed in the input documents (using the same prefix). You can also specify wildcard values "*", "*:" and ":*" in the second argument. See the description for functx:name-test for details.

The function does not remove all descendants, just children; see functx:remove-elements-deep to remove all descendants with the specified names.

Note: this function is intended to change the way elements appear in the results of a query, not to update them in an XML database. To update your XML database, you should use the implementation-specific update functions of your processor.

Arguments and Return Type

XQuery Function Declaration

declare namespace functx = "http://www.functx.com";
declare function functx:remove-elements
  ( $elements as element()* ,
    $names as xs:string* )  as element()* {

   for $element in $elements
   return element
     {node-name($element)}
     {$element/@*,
      $element/node()[not(functx:name-test(name(),$names))] }
 } ;

Examples

<in-xml>
   <a>123</a>
   <a>456</a>
   <c>Mixed <b>content</b></c>
</in-xml>

<in-xml xmlns:x="http://x">
   <a>123</a>
   <x:a>456</x:a>
   <c>Mixed <x:a>content</x:a></c>
</in-xml>

functx:remove-elements(
     $in-xml-1,
     'c')

<in-xml>
  <a>123</a>
  <a>456</a>
</in-xml>

functx:remove-elements(
     $in-xml-1,
     ('a','b'))

<in-xml>
  <c>Mixed <b>content</b>
  </c>
</in-xml>

functx:remove-elements(
     $in-xml-2,
     'x:a')

<in-xml>
  <a>123</a>
  <c>Mixed <x:a xmlns:x="http://x">content</x:a>
  </c>
</in-xml>

Depends On

See Also

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