I have the following XML:

- <channel>
  <title>Dishwashers</title>
  <requireauth>0</requireauth>
  <id>977</id>
     - <channel>
       <title>TestChannel 01</title>
       <id>980</id>
       - <channel>
           <title>subchannel b</title>
           <id>984</id>
               - <channel>
                   <title>subchannel b</title>
                   <id>999</id>
                   <parentchannel>984</parentchannel>
                </channel>
           <parentchannel>980</parentchannel>
       </channel>
  <parentchannel>975</parentchannel>
</channel>

What I want to do via XSLT is I have a variable <xsl:variable name="ch_selected"/>. I want to traverse the entire tree looking for the parentchannelid of $ch_selected. Then find out what channel it belongs to an so on to the top of the tree.

So channel id = 999
find and set a variable for it's parentchannelid which is 984
Find and set a variable for 984's parentchannelid which is 980
Find and set a variable for 980's parentchannel which is 975

The channel nodes will only ever be 3 levels deep.
Channel id 975 is the top or highest root channnel.

And all the parentchannelid's found and identified need to be available to the entire xslt page.

I've tried this with nested for-each loops but it looks like my variables then are only local to the for-each or if loops.

Thanks,

Shawn

Here is the XSLT I was writing when I realized my variable was not globally available:

<xsl:variable name="ch_selected"><xsl:value-of select="/root/emcid"/></xsl:variable>
        <xsl:for-each select="/root/channel">
            <xsl:if test="id = $ch_selected">
                ppid1=<xsl:value-of select="parentchannel"/>
            </xsl:if>

            <xsl:if test="channel">
                    <xsl:for-each select="channel">
                    <xsl:if test="id = $ch_selected">
                        ppid2=<xsl:value-of select="parentchannel"/>



                    </xsl:if>
                    <xsl:if test="channel">
                            <xsl:for-each select="channel">
                            <xsl:if test="id = $ch_selected">
                                ppid3=<xsl:value-of select="parentchannel"/>
                                <xsl:variable name="ch_at3"><xsl:value-of select="parentchannel"/></xsl:variable>

                            </xsl:if>
                            </xsl:for-each>shawn=<xsl:value-of select="$ch_at3"/>
                        </xsl:if>
                    </xsl:for-each>
                </xsl:if>

        </xsl:for-each>

Looks like you're trying to code this in a way that doesn't work for XSLT, but you haven't shown any code so it's hard to see where your misunderstanding lies.

Let us know what output you want to produce and we may be able to suggest the right design approach.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/
Author, XSLT Programmer's Reference and XPath 2.0 Programmer's Reference

The ouput I would like is an xsl variable (or 2 or 3) set for the parentchannel of each channel node.
Each <channel> has an <id> and <parentchannel> elements.
<channel>
    <channel>
         <channel>

         </channel>
    </channel>

</channel>
I have a specific channel id provided via an <xsl:variable>. I need the parentchannel for that channel and all it's ancestors up to the root.

An xsl:variable is not an output, it's purely a means to an end. In this case, it's probably not the right means to the end.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/
Author, XSLT Programmer's Reference and XPath 2.0 Programmer's Reference