Rolf Kemper wrote:

> What I wnat to do is to get a set of distinct nodes.

What is "distinct" ? Unique within one TEST node ?
Or Unique within one Root node ?

I wrote a short xmlgawk script, which tries to
reproduce your results. The script even looks
readable to me. Half of it consists of printing
test results:

# distinct_nodes.awk
# comp.text.xml 2004-10-01
# Read all nodes of type pin and find the ones
# which have a unique name attribute.
# JK 2004-10-01

BEGIN {
  XMLMODE=1
  print "all pins of all test nodes ==>"
}

XMLSTARTELEM == "Pin" {
  count[XMLATTR["PinName"]] ++
  print XMLATTR["PinName"]
}

END {
  print "multiple pins  ==>"
  for (PinName in count) {
    if (count[PinName] > 1)
      print PinName, count[PinName]
  }
  print "unique pins ==>"
  for (PinName in count) {
    if (count[PinName] == 1)
      print PinName, count[PinName]
  }
}


> all pins of all test nodes ==> OK 
> A
> B
> B
> C
> X
> A
> D
> C
> X
> A
> 
> multiple pins  ==> OK 
> B
> A
> C
> X
> A
> 
> unique pins ==> NOT GOOD !! 
> B
> A
> C
> X
> A

The results I get are:
all pins of all test nodes ==>
A
B
B
C
X
A
D
C
X
A
multiple pins  ==>
A 3
B 2
C 2
X 2
unique pins ==>
D 1

> ( I expected B A C X )
> #################### End #################################

Why do you expect B A C X ?
No matter how I understand "distinct", I would not
call B A C X "distinct" pins.


BTW: Do the Electrical Engineers at NEC really use XML
for counting their beans .. errhhh pins .. ?