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XSLT <xsl:for-each>

XSLT <xsl:for-each>

The <xsl:for-each> element loops through each node in a specified node set.

Syntax

<xsl:for-each select="expression">
<!-- Content -->
</xsl:for-each>

Attributes

AttributeValueRequired/OptionalDescription
selectexpressionRequiredAn XPath expression that specifies which node set to be processed.

Example

For the following examples, consider the XML document about a bookstore shown below:

books.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="books.xsl"?>

<bookstore>
<book category="children">
<title lang="en">Harry Potter</title>
<author>J K. Rowling</author>
<year>2005</year>
<price>29.99</price>
</book>
<book category="web">
<title lang="en">XQuery Tips</title>
<author>Tom Nolan</author>
<year>2022</year>
<price>39.99</price>
</book>
<book category="web">
<title lang="en">Learn XML</title>
<author>Tutorial Reference</author>
<year>2022</year>
<price>9.99</price>
</book>
</bookstore>

Example 1

The example below loops trough each book element outputs the title for each book:

books.xsl
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">

<xsl:template match="/">
<div>
<xsl:for-each select="bookstore/book">
<p><xsl:value-of select="title" /></p>
</xsl:for-each>
</div>
</xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>

Example 2

The example below loops trough each book element and creates a table row with the values from title and author for each book:

books.xsl
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">

<xsl:template match="/">
<html>
<body>
<h1>The Bookstore</h1>
<table border="1">
<tr bgcolor="#6565d5">
<th>Title</th>
<th>Author</th>
</tr>
<xsl:for-each select="bookstore/book">
<tr>
<td><xsl:value-of select="title" /></td>
<td><xsl:value-of select="author" /></td>
</tr>
</xsl:for-each>
</table>
</body>
</html>
</xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>