Question

I’m exporting an XML file from InDesign. The text in this file contains superscripts referring to a specific grammatical concept; however, these superscripts are exported as text in the XML file. I need to write an XSLT so that when it’s applied to the InDesign file it will simply add a little tag to the superscript.

This is how it’s exported:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<Root>
<Content>
<PhraseNative aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="260.5">
<Phrase>    1.  Mark is1a playing2 videogames.</Phrase> 
</PhraseNative>
</Content>
</Root>  

This should be the final code.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<Root>
<Content>
<PhraseNative aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="260.5">
<Phrase>    1.  Mark is<tag>1a</tag> playing<tag>2</tag> videogames.</Phrase> 
</PhraseNative>
</Content>
</Root>

These tags would always appear whenever a number and a letter are the two or three last digits of a string. Sometimes it will be only a number. The output doesn’t change at all. This is just so the tags are not lost when exported back into a web page.

Answer 1

You tagged the question with XSLT 2.0, so here’s a 2.0 option.

Note: I had to add a dummy xmlns for the aid prefix.

Also, you’ll most likely need to refine the regex, but this should get you started.

XML Input

<Root>
  <Content>
    <PhraseNative aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="260.5" xmlns:aid="somexmlns">
      <Phrase>    1.  Mark is1a playing2 videogames.</Phrase> 
    </PhraseNative>
  </Content>
</Root>

XSLT 2.0

<xsl:stylesheet version="2.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
  xmlns:aid="somexmlns">
  <xsl:output indent="yes"/>
  <xsl:strip-space elements="*"/>

  <xsl:template match="node()|@*">
    <xsl:copy>
      <xsl:apply-templates select="node()|@*"/>
    </xsl:copy>
  </xsl:template>

  <xsl:template match="Phrase">
    <xsl:copy>
      <xsl:apply-templates select="@*"/>
      <xsl:analyze-string select="." regex="([a-z]+)([0-9]+[a-z]*)">
        <xsl:matching-substring>
          <xsl:value-of select="regex-group(1)"/>
          <tag>
            <xsl:value-of select="regex-group(2)"/>    
          </tag>
        </xsl:matching-substring>
        <xsl:non-matching-substring><xsl:value-of select="."/></xsl:non-matching-substring>
      </xsl:analyze-string>
    </xsl:copy>
  </xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>

XML Output

<Root>
   <Content>
      <PhraseNative xmlns:aid="somexmlns" aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1"
                    aid:ccolwidth="260.5">
         <Phrase>    1.  Mark is<tag>1a</tag> playing<tag>2</tag> videogames.</Phrase>
      </PhraseNative>
   </Content>
</Root>

Tested using Saxon-HE 9.3.