Select specific node and namespaces

I've got a minor problem, and I'm hoping there's a simple answer.

First, the background: I've got a set of XML schema documents that I use to
validate instance documents in a content-replication system. I also have
Schematron rules embedded in these documents. When content is replicated, I
validate the document against the XML schema, then if successful, against
the Schematron rules.

All pretty straightforward so far, I'd guess. However, when a node fails to
be validated against the Schematron rules, I'd like to replace it. My
validating stylesheet, generated by schematron-xml.xsl, produces output that
contains a "failed-assert" node for each instance node that failed to be
validated for whatever reason. One of the properties of the failed-assert
node is a property called "Location". It contains something like the
following:

/topic[1]/content[1]/para[1]/link[1]

Which is the location in the instance document where the validation failed.
I'm trying to write a script that will replace this node. The instance
document is in a namespace of my own definition. When I try to select the
failed node using the Location attribute, it fails, apparently because it
can't find the namespace. I'm using MSXML 4.0. If I do something like this
(pseudocode):

objXMLDoc.replaceChild objErrNode,
objXMLDoc.selectSingleNode("/topic[1]/content[1]/para[1]/link[1]")

It fails, because objXMLDoc has a namespace, which is not represented by the
XPath query, so the selectSingleNode call returns NULL. However, if I add
the namespace before the query:

objXMLDoc.setProperty "SelectionNamespaces", "xmlns:myns="mynamespaceURN"

It still fails unless I modify the XPath to something like:
/myns:topic[1]/myns:content[1]/myns:para[1]/myns:link[1]

I guess my question is, how can I select a node in this fashion without
having to modify the Location string so much? I could simply replace all the
"/" characters with "/myns:" but that just seems kludgy. I have a feeling
that this is the result of my limited experience with XPath.

Another thing I'm considering is trying to modify "schematron-xml.xsl" so it
generates fully namespace-qualified XPath, but I'd prefer not to do that
unless I have to. I don't think it would be very portable.

Any comments or suggestions would be welcome-

Thank you,

Corey Snow

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Received on Tuesday, 11 June 2002 17:08:06 UTC