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XSLT <xsl:sort> Element

The <xsl:sort> element is used to specify a sort criterion for the output.

<xsl:sort> Element​

Syntax​

The syntax of <xsl:sort> is as follows:

<xsl:sort 
    select=string-expression
    lang={nmtoken}
    data-type={"text"|"number"|QName}
    order={"ascending"|"descending"}
    case-order={"upper-first"|"lower-first"}>
</xsl:sort>

Attributes​

The table describes the meaning of the attributes of <xsl:sort>:

NameDescription
selectIt is used for sorting key of the node.
langIt specifies language alphabet used to determine sort order.
data-typeIt specifies data-type of the text.
orderIt is used to specify the sorting order. By default sorting order is ascending order.
case-orderIt is used to specify sorting order of string by capitalization. Default is "upper-first".

Example​

Let's see an example:

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>
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>
            <h2>The Bookstore</h2>
            <table border="1">
                <tr bgcolor="#6565d5">
                    <th>Title</th>
                    <th>Author</th>
                    <th>Year</th>
                    <th>Price</th>
                </tr>  
                <xsl:for-each select="bookstore/book">
                <xsl:sort select="author"/>
                    <tr>
                        <td><xsl:value-of select="title"/></td>
                        <td><xsl:value-of select="author"/></td>
                        <td><xsl:value-of select="year"/></td>
                        <td><xsl:value-of select="price"/></td>
                    </tr>
                </xsl:for-each>
            </table>
        </body>
    </html>
</xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>
note

The select attribute indicates what XML element to sort on.

In the example, the records are sorted by author.

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