GerixSoft

The XML Pipeline in XSLT technique requires every xsl:template and xsl:apply-templates in the chained stylesheet to have mode attribute.

This could be simplified if XSLT would allow specifying mode in xsl:include. So <xsl:include href="link1.xsl" mode="link1"/> would mean "use link1 as default mode in link1.xsl":

1. if xsl:template or xsl:apply-templates in the contained stylesheet do not have mode attribute, they receive it from xsl:include the stylesheet was included with
2. if you still want to reference default mode from link1.xsl, you should use mode="#default"
3. if link1.xsl includes identity.xsl, link1 mode is tunneled to identity.xsl.

If xsl:include/@mode would be available in XSLT processors, XML Pipeline code would look much simpler:

• chain.xsl

  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
  
  <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" xmlns:exsl="http://exslt.org/common">
  
      <xsl:output method="xml" omit-xml-declaration="no" indent="no" encoding="UTF-8"/>
  
      <xsl:include href="link1.xsl" mode="link1"/>
      <xsl:include href="link2.xsl" mode="link2"/>
      <xsl:include href="link3.xsl" mode="link3"/>
  
      <xsl:template match="/">
          <xsl:variable name="link1">
              <xsl:apply-templates mode="link1" select="node()"/>
          </xsl:variable>
          <xsl:variable name="link2">
              <xsl:apply-templates mode="link2" select="exsl:node-set($link1)/node()"/>
          </xsl:variable>
          <xsl:variable name="link3">
              <xsl:apply-templates mode="link3" select="exsl:node-set($link2)/node()"/>
          </xsl:variable>
  
          <xsl:copy-of select="exsl:node-set($link3)/node()"/>
      </xsl:template>
  
  </xsl:stylesheet>
  

• link1.xsl

  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
  
  <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
  
  	<xsl:import href="identity.xsl" />
  
      <xsl:template match="a">
          <aa>
              <xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()"/>
              <b/>
          </aa>
      </xsl:template>
  
  </xsl:stylesheet>
  

• link2.xsl

  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
  
  <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
  
  	<xsl:import href="identity.xsl" />
  
      <xsl:template match="b">
          <bb>
              <xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()"/>
              <c/>
          </bb>
      </xsl:template>
  
  </xsl:stylesheet>
  

• link3.xsl

  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
  
  <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
  
  	<xsl:import href="identity.xsl" />
  
      <xsl:template match="c">
          <cc>
              <xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()"/>
          </cc>
      </xsl:template>
  
  </xsl:stylesheet>
  

• identity.xsl

  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
  
  <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
  
      <xsl:template priority="-9" match="@*|node()">
          <xsl:copy>
              <xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()"/>
          </xsl:copy>
      </xsl:template>
  
  </xsl:stylesheet>
  

Attached you can find my patches to Saxon 9.1 and Xalan-J 2.7.1 enabling @mode in xsl:include.