"Joseph J. Kesselman" <keshlam-nospam@c...> wrote in message 
news:486a8599$1@kcnews01...
> rhino wrote:
>> <p><xsl:value-of select="firstname"/><xsl:value-of 
>> select="lastname"/></p>
>> So, how do I get a blank space to appear between firstname and lastname?
>
> The most straightforward solution is:
>
> <p><xsl:value-of select="firstname"/><xsl:text> </xsl:text><xsl:value-of 
> select="lastname"/></p>
>
> This is necessary because whitespace in stylesheets is normally discarded 
> unless it's next to non-whitespace text. Wrapping the literal whitespace 
> in <xsl:text> tells the processor "I really want this to be output exactly 
> as it appears here."
>
> There are other ways to do it, of course -- anything that generates a 
> whitespace value will accomplish the task -- but this is the one that will 
> make the stylesheet easiest for a human to read.
>
> FWIW, we've seen a number of cases where the tutorials at w3schools have 
> been ... well, let's be charitable and say "incomplete". They may have 
> improved since then, but you might want to consider looking at other 
> sources as well or instead. My standard recommendation is the 
> DeveloperWorks XML site, http://www.ibm.com/xml, but I admit to being 
> biased.

Thank you, Joseph! I was just going to post back to say that I'd figured out 
my problem via a Google search; I used the following and it worked fine:
<li><xsl:value-of select="firstname"/>&#32;<xsl:value-of 
select="lastname"/></li>

I tried your way and it worked fine, too. I also tried putting multiple 
spaces within the <xsl:text> </xsl:text> block and was surprised that only 
one space was displayed no matter how many I put there. If I ever need to 
put multiple spaces somewhere, I may do it with character entitites; it 
would be easier (or at least use less space) to do &#32; five times than to 
do <xsl:text> </xsl:text> five times! But there's probably a better way than 
that which I just haven't learned yet ;-)

I agree that the w3schools tutorials are not the best. I've used them with 
some success in the past simply to get a few basics under my belt, then 
moved on to better tutorials, references, or books as I got the basics 
sorted out. The w3schools tutorials are pretty superficial and really only 
give you a few basic concepts and tutorials and I don't find them 
particularly thorough either.

I appreciate your suggestion about a better source of information. I'll have 
a look at the IBM XML site in a minute.

Thanks for your help and your time!

--

Rhino