note 92231 added to function.simplexml-element-xpath

Please note the counter-intuitive behaviour of this function. It will *always* search the entire original document that you loaded, from the root level. I would expect that if you are calling the xpath() method on a child element, the search would be performed relative to that element, but this is not the case. In fact there seems to be no way to restrict the search to the scope of a sub-element without knowing the full path to that sub-element, and prepending it to the xpath string. Example: ... <library name="library1"> <book id="book1">...</book> <book id="book2">...</book> </library> <library name="library2"> <book id="book1">...</book> <book id="book2">...</book> </library> ... <?php //Select the first library (library1) $myLibrary = $xml->library[0]; //Search that library for a specific book $myBook = $myLibrary->xpath('book[@id="book2"]'); //will return NO RESULTS $myBook = $myLibrary->xpath('library[0]/book[@id="book2"]'); //will return the book we want $myBook = $myLibrary->xpath('//book[@id="book2"]'); //will return BOTH book2 records (not just the record from library1) ?> ---- Server IP: 117.55.229.1 Probable Submitter: 128.184.148.168 ---- Manual Page -- http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.simplexml-element-xpath.php Edit -- https://master.php.net/note/edit/92231 Del: integrated -- https://master.php.net/note/delete/92231/integrated Del: useless -- https://master.php.net/note/delete/92231/useless Del: bad code -- https://master.php.net/note/delete/92231/bad+code Del: spam -- https://master.php.net/note/delete/92231/spam Del: non-english -- https://master.php.net/note/delete/92231/non-english Del: in docs -- https://master.php.net/note/delete/92231/in+docs Del: other reasons-- https://master.php.net/note/delete/92231 Reject -- https://master.php.net/note/reject/92231 Search -- https://master.php.net/manage/user-notes.php