Perfect.  Thanks.  Just out of curiosity, is this possible
(practical?) in XSLT 1.0?

Yes and yes -- read about the Muenchian method for grouping.



Actually, this reminds me that six years ago I published a snippet in
topxml.com solving exactly your problem in XSLT 1.0:


  http://www.topxml.com/code/default.asp?p=3&id=v20010129150851







--
Cheers,
Dimitre Novatchev
---------------------------------------
Truly great madness cannot be achieved without significant intelligence.
---------------------------------------
To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk
-------------------------------------
You've achieved success in your field when you don't know whether what
you're doing is work or play


On 3/3/07, Kevin Grover <kevin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Perfect.  Thanks.  Just out of curiosity, is this possible
(practical?) in XSLT 1.0?

On 3/3/07, Dimitre Novatchev <dnovatchev@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> You are not using XSLT 2.0 to its full potential.
>
> The solution is as easy as this:
>
> <xsl:stylesheet version="2.0"
>  xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
>  >
>   <xsl:output method="text"/>
>
>  <xsl:template match="/">
>    <xsl:for-each-group select="*/author"
>      group-by="substring(name/@file-as,1,1)"
>     >
>      <xsl:text>&#xA;&#xA;</xsl:text>
>      <xsl:value-of select="current-grouping-key()"/>
>      <xsl:text>&#xA;</xsl:text>
>
>      <xsl:for-each select="current-group()">
>        <xsl:value-of select="name/@file-as"/>
>        <xsl:text>&#xA;</xsl:text>
>      </xsl:for-each>
>    </xsl:for-each-group>
>  </xsl:template>
> </xsl:stylesheet>
>
> and  when applied on the provided xml document it produces the wanted result:
>
>
>
> A
> Adams, Douglas
> Anderson, Kevin J.
> Anthony, Piers
> Archer, Jeffrey
>
>
> B
> Baldacci, David
> Ball, Margaret
> Bradley, Marion Zimmer
>
>
> C
> Carcaterra, Lorenzo
> Card, Orson Scott
> Chalker, Jack L.
>
>
> D
> Dahl, Roald
> Daley, Brian
> Dann, Jack
>
>
>
> --
> Cheers,
> Dimitre Novatchev
> ---------------------------------------
> Truly great madness cannot be achieved without significant intelligence.
> ---------------------------------------
> To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk
> -------------------------------------
> You've achieved success in your field when you don't know whether what
> you're doing is work or play
>
>
>
>
> On 3/3/07, Kevin Grover <kevin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > I have an XSLT/XPath Question that I've been beating my head against
> > for a while.
> >
> > I have a list of authors with a name element and a file-as attribute
> > (XPATH: /booklist/author/name/@file-as).  I currently build a Table of
> > Contents sorted by the author/name/@file-as attribute.  That works OK.
> >  I want to add further markup (by putting authors in groups by the
> > first character of their last name).
> >
> > I can get the first character of the last name, I've even created a
> > key that allows me to access the nodes of authors by the first
> > character in the last name (see the commented out section of the b.xsl
> > file included below).  However, I can not figure out how to get a list
> > of distinct characters (from the last names) so that I can iterate
> > over them and generate my list.
> >
> > Here are stripped down example source files:
> >
> > Exmaple author file: (file a.xml)
> >
> > <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
> > <booklist>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Adams, Douglas">Douglas Adams</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Anderson, Kevin J.">Kevin J. Anderson</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Anthony, Piers">Piers Anthony</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Archer, Jeffrey">Jeffrey Archer</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Baldacci, David">David Baldacci</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Ball, Margaret">Margaret Ball</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Bradley, Marion Zimmer">Marion Zimmer Bradley</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Carcaterra, Lorenzo">Lorenzo Carcaterra</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Card, Orson Scott">Orson Scott Card</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Chalker, Jack L.">Jack L. Chalker</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Dahl, Roald">Roald Dahl</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Daley, Brian">Brian Daley</name>
> >   </author>
> >   <author>
> >      <name file-as="Dann, Jack">Jack Dann</name>
> >   </author>
> > </booklist>
> >
> >
> > I can extract the authors and generate a table of contents with the
> > following XSLT: (b.xsl)
> >
> > <?xml version="1.0"?>
> > <xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
> >                xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
> >                >
> >    <xsl:output method="xml"/>
> >    <xsl:output indent="yes"/>
> >    <xsl:strip-space elements="*"/>
> >
> >    <xsl:key name="alet" match="//author" use="substring(name/@file-as,1,1)"/>
> >
> >    <xsl:template match="/booklist">
> >        <xsl:call-template name="gen-toc"/>
> >    </xsl:template>
> >
> >    <!-- Generate Table of Contents -->
> >    <xsl:template name="gen-toc">
> >      <div id="toc" class="toc">
> > <!--
> >      <h1>Test</h1>
> >      <ul>
> >      <xsl:for-each select="key('alet','A')">
> >        <li><xsl:value-of select="name/@file-as"/></li>
> >      </xsl:for-each>
> >      </ul>
> > -->
> >      <h1>Table of Contents (by Author)</h1>
> >      <ul>
> >      <xsl:for-each select="//author/name">
> >        <xsl:sort select="@file-as"/>
> >        <li><a href="#{generate-id(..)}"><xsl:value-of
> > select="@file-as"/></a></li>
> >      </xsl:for-each>
> >      </ul>
> >      </div>
> >    </xsl:template>
> >
> > </xsl:stylesheet>
> >
> >
> > This works.  It generates this: (out.xml)
> >
> > <?xml version="1.0"?>
> > <div id="toc" class="toc">
> >  <h1>Table of Contents (by Author)</h1>
> >  <ul>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91524">Adams, Douglas</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91570">Anderson, Kevin J.</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91578">Anthony, Piers</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91588">Archer, Jeffrey</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91597">Baldacci, David</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91607">Ball, Margaret</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91617">Bradley, Marion Zimmer</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id91627">Carcaterra, Lorenzo</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id93622">Card, Orson Scott</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id93633">Chalker, Jack L.</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id93643">Dahl, Roald</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id93653">Daley, Brian</a>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a href="#id93663">Dann, Jack</a>
> >    </li>
> >  </ul>
> > </div>
> >
> >
> > I want to change that so that I have the authors in subsections, with
> > the first letter of their last names as the the main entry, like so
> >
> >        A
> >                //author/name/@file-as[.=='A']
> >        B
> >                //author/name/@file-as[.=='B']
> >        etc..
> >
> > Like this output: (out-desired.xml)
> >
> > [This was hand edited, I have not yet figured out how to automatically
> > generate it.]
> >
> > <?xml version="1.0"?>
> > <div id="toc" class="toc">
> >  <h1>Table of Contents (by Author)</h1>
> >  <ul>
> >    <li>
> >      <a name="A">A</a>
> >      <ul>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91524">Adams, Douglas</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91570">Anderson, Kevin J.</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91578">Anthony, Piers</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91588">Archer, Jeffrey</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91597">Baldacci, David</a>
> >        </li>
> >      </ul>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a name="B">B</a>
> >      <ul>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91607">Ball, Margaret</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91617">Bradley, Marion Zimmer</a>
> >        </li>
> >      </ul>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a name="C">C</a>
> >      <ul>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id91627">Carcaterra, Lorenzo</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id93622">Card, Orson Scott</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id93633">Chalker, Jack L.</a>
> >        </li>
> >      </ul>
> >    </li>
> >    <li>
> >      <a name="D">D</a>
> >      <ul>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id93643">Dahl, Roald</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id93653">Daley, Brian</a>
> >        </li>
> >        <li>
> >          <a href="#id93663">Dann, Jack</a>
> >        </li>
> >      </ul>
> >    </li>
> >  </ul>
> > </div>
> >
> >
> > I've tried some XPath 2 stuff and XQuery.  I can get a list of first
> > letters using XQuery (and thus XPath 2)
> >
> > For example: (file fl.xq)
> >
> > for $a in //author/name/substring(@file-as,1,1)
> > return
> >  <c>{$a}</c>
> >
> >
> > Generates a list of the characters of the last name (although not unique).
> >
> > I tried embedding something like the above "for $a in.." into an XSLT
> > 2.0 stylesheet, and assign it to a variable, but I get an error from
> > saxon when I tried it.
> >
> > Something like this is desired.... (with UNIQUE-SET-OF-FIRST-LETTERS)
> > replaced with something that works.  I set this to XSLT 2, and tried
> > "$letters//l" in place of that place-holder text
> > (UNIQUE-SET-OF-FIRST-LETTERS).  It generated the Letter items A B C
> > .., but all of the sub <ul>s where empty.
> >
> > <?xml version="1.0"?>
> > <xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version="1.0">
> >  <xsl:output method="xml"/>
> >  <xsl:output indent="yes"/>
> >  <xsl:strip-space elements="*"/>
> >
> >  <xsl:key name="alet" match="//author" use="substring(name/@file-as,1,1)"/>
> >
> > <!--
> >  <xsl:variable name="letters">
> >    <l>A</l>
> >    <l>B</l>
> >    <l>C</l>
> >    <l>D</l>
> >    <l>E</l>
> >  </xsl:variable>
> > -->
> >  <xsl:template match="/booklist">
> >    <xsl:call-template name="gen-toc"/>
> >  </xsl:template>
> >
> >  <!-- Generate Table of Contents -->
> >  <xsl:template name="gen-toc">
> >    <div id="toc" class="toc">
> >      <h1>Table of Contents (by Author)</h1>
> >      <ul>
> >        <xsl:for-each select="UNIQUE-SET-OF-FIRST-LETTERS">
> >          <xsl:variable name="lc" select="."/>
> >          <li>
> >            <a>
> >              <xsl:attribute name="name" select="$lc"/>
> >              <xsl:value-of select="$lc"/>
> >            </a>
> >            <ul>
> >              <xsl:for-each select="key('alet',$lc)">
> >                <xsl:sort select="name/@file-as"/>
> >                <li>
> >                  <a href="#{generate-id(.)}">
> >                    <xsl:value-of select="name/@file-as"/>
> >                  </a>
> >                </li>
> >              </xsl:for-each>
> >            </ul>
> >          </li>
> >        </xsl:for-each>
> >      </ul>
> >    </div>
> >  </xsl:template>
> > </xsl:stylesheet>
> >
> > Hopefully, I didn't include too much detail.
> >
> > Any help appreciated.  Thanks.