If you sometimes want to generate an {xx}help element, and sometimes a
{yy}help element, where {xx} and {yy} are different namespaces, then you
need to use conditional logic that changes the element name: in XSLT 2.0 you
can write

<xsl:element name="help" namespace="{if ($param} then '' else
'http://purl.org/rss/1.0/'}>

In XSLT 1.0 you will need to use xsl:choose. The caller of the template will
need to supply an explicit parameter saying which namespace is required.
There is no way of generating an element and saying simply "put this in the
same namespace as its new parent".

Namespaces are not attributes. The namespace is part of the element name,
even though it is not written explicitly as such. You have full control when
you generate an element over both the local name of the element and its
namespace name. The serializer will automatically generate namespace
declarations that respect the namespaces in which you have placed your
constructed elements.

It seems a rather unusual requirement to have a template that sometimes
generates an {xx}help element, and sometimes a {yy}help element, where {xx}
and {yy} are different namespaces, because the meaning of local names like
"help" depends entirely on which namespace they are in, and the names in one
namespace are usually unrelated to those in a different namespace.

Regards,

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: tom tom [mailto:tomxsllist@xxxxxxxxxxx] 
> Sent: 01 October 2004 17:15
> To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: RE: [xsl] unwanted xmlns="" attribute
> 
> Thankyou, this solves half of my problem.
> 
> However the included file is also included from a second XSLT 
> file with 
> contains no existing namespace references. If I add  
> xmlns="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/" to <help> this renders as <help 
> xmlns="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/"/> - I do not want the 
> attribute to appear 
> in the second file.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> >From: "Michael Kay" <mike@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
> >Reply-To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> >To: <xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> >Subject: RE: [xsl] unwanted xmlns="" attribute
> >Date: Fri, 1 Oct 2004 16:35:58 +0100
> >
> >When you say you don't want the xmlns="" to appear on the 
> <help/> element,
> >what you presumably mean is that you want the <help> element 
> to be in the
> >namespace "http://purl.org/rss/1.0/". The answer is to put it in that
> >namespace, for example by writing it in the stylesheet as
> >
> ><help xmlns="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/"/>
> >
> >Michael Kay
> >http://www.saxonica.com/
> >
> >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: tom tom [mailto:tomxsllist@xxxxxxxxxxx]
> > > Sent: 01 October 2004 15:47
> > > To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > > Subject: [xsl] unwanted xmlns="" attribute
> > >
> > > In my including file I have:
> > >
> > > <xsl:template match="test">
> > > 	<rdf:RDF xmlns="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/"
> > > xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#"
> > > xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/">
> > > 		<xsl:apply-templates select="." mode="testy"/>
> > > 	</rdf:RDF>
> > > </xsl:template>
> > >
> > > In my included file I have:
> > >
> > > <xsl:template match="test" mode="testy">
> > > 	<help/>
> > > </xsl:template>
> > >
> > > My output comes out as:
> > >
> > > <rdf:RDF xmlns="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/"
> > > xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
> > > xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#">
> > > 	<help xmlns=""/>
> > > </rdf:RDF>
> > >
> > >
> > > I do not want the xmlns="" attribute to appear on the help
> > > element. I have
> > > tried numerous permutations using the exclude-result-prefixes on
> > > xsl:stylesheet to no avail. I am using MSXML 3. Can anyone advise?
> > >
> > > _________________________________________________________________
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> 
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