I wish to get a count of nodes in an xml file in vb.net, so I am using the following, as a simple example: MyCount = xmlNodePart.Current.Select.//MyNode/Record[*]).Count I saw in some xml specs that instead of [*] it should be [@*], but that does not work. Why would the @ symbol be needed? Derek
"Derek Hart" wrote in message news:#WL0h6#1IHA.528@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl... > I wish to get a count of nodes in an xml file in vb.net, so I am using the > following, as a simple example: > > > > MyCount = xmlNodePart.Current.Select.//MyNode/Record[*]).Count > > > > I saw in some xml specs that instead of [*] it should be [@*], but that > does not work. Why would the @ symbol be needed? > > > > Derek > > * represents a wildcard for current node type, normally this means all elements, @ is a shortcut for attributes so @* is all attributes. If you want all nodes in a file you do //node() or count(//node()) The expression you gave, if it were legal, tries to do something different altogether. It is fetching the count of those Record elements that have a parent of MyNode and that have child elements. -- Joe Fawcett (MVP - XML) http://joe.fawcett.name
