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Asked: 2026-06-12T15:25:09+00:00

Whilst transforming XHTML to XHTML with XSL I have a problem with namespaces. Consider

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Whilst transforming XHTML to XHTML with XSL I have a problem with namespaces. Consider as an example input:

<!DOCTYPE html SYSTEM "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
    <head><title>Test</title></head>
    <body>
        <p>Remove this</p>
    </body>
</html>

Then the following transformation does not work (e.g. does not remove the <p />):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
    xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
    <xsl:template match="@*|node()" name="copy">
        <xsl:copy><xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()" /></xsl:copy>
    </xsl:template>

    <xsl:template match="p" />
</xsl:stylesheet>

But this one does:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
    xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
    xmlns:xhtml="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
    <xsl:template match="@*|node()" name="copy">
        <xsl:copy><xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()" /></xsl:copy>
    </xsl:template>

    <xsl:template match="xhtml:p" />
</xsl:stylesheet>

My problem and question is: How can I change the XSLT so that I do not have to add prefixes to all the XHTML elements and it still get to match them? From what I tried so far, adding a default namespace like <xsl:stylesheet xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" /> does not achieve this.

Thanks for your help!

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team
    How can I change the XSLT so that I do not have to add prefixes to all the XHTML elements and it still get to match them?

    This is possible, but I would recommens defining the namespace and using the preefix in referring to elements in this namespace:

    <xsl:template match="*[local-name()='p']" />

    Warning:

    This technique can be safe only if it is guaranteed that there arent two elements with the same local-name() but in different namespaces.

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