Special characteristics of XSLT in ABAP/SAP?

[Former Member]

Hey everyone,

after my last approach of working with SAP Simple Transformations (https://answers.sap.com/questions/124003/manipulating-incoming-json-with-simple-transformat.html) I'm now working with an incoming XML and a XSLT Transformation. It should use the input XML and transform it into a SAP structure.

My XML (shortened example):

<result>
  <row>
    <idSite>3</idSite>
    <idVisit>5474057</idVisit>
    <actionDetails>
      <row>
        <type>goal</type>
        <goalId>2</goalId>
        <revenue>0</revenue>
        <goalPageId>45316491</goalPageId>
        <serverTimePretty>Feb 12, 2017 23:55:14</serverTimePretty>
        <timestamp>1486943714</timestamp>
      </row>
      ...
    </actionDetails>     
    <searches>0</searches>
    <actions>24</actions>
  </row>
  ...
</result>

My XSLT (also shortened, but the problem is shown):

<xsl:transform version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" xmlns:sap="http://www.sap.com/sapxsl">
<xsl:strip-space elements="*"/>
<xsl:template match="/">
  <asx:abap xmlns:asx="http://www.sap.com/abapxml" version="1.0">
    <asx:values>
      <RESULT>
        <xsl:for-each select="result/row">
          <VISIT>
            <SERVERDATE> <xsl:value-of select="serverDate"/> </SERVERDATE>
            <USERID>  <xsl:value-of select="userId"/>      </USERID>
            <VISITORTYPE><xsl:value-of select="visitorType"/> </VISITORTYPE>
            <SEARCHES>    <xsl:value-of select="searches"/> </SEARCHES>
            <ACTIONS> <xsl:value-of select="actions"/>  </ACTIONS>
            <xsl:for-each select="actionDetails">
              <xsl:variable name="row" select="row" />
              <ACTIONDETAILS>
                <TYPE> <xsl:value-of select="$row/type"/> </TYPE>
                <URL> <xsl:value-of select="$row/url"/> </URL>
                <GOALNAME><xsl:value-of select="$row/goalName"/></GOALNAME>
                <ITEMS> <xsl:value-of select="$row/items"/> </ITEMS>
                <xsl:for-each select="itemDetails/row">
                  <ITEMDETAILS>
                    <ITEMSKU> <xsl:value-of select="itemSKU"/></ITEMSKU>
                    <ITEMNAME><xsl:value-of select="itemName"/></ITEMNAME>
                  </ITEMDETAILS>
                </xsl:for-each>
              </ACTIONDETAILS>
            </xsl:for-each>
            <RESULT>  <xsl:value-of select="result"/> </RESULT>
            <MESSAGE> <xsl:value-of select="message"/> </MESSAGE>
          </VISIT>
        </xsl:for-each>
      </RESULT>
    </asx:values>
  </asx:abap>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:transform>

Problem: Once it reaches the first xsl:value-of inside of the inner for-each (at TYPE), it crashes and the debugger throws an CX_XSLT_FORMAT_ERROR. Without debugging it just says "Unexpected text for XML-ABAP transformation."

When I validate my files with an online XSLT Validator (http://www.freeformatter.com/xsl-transformer.html), it does work fine.

Now my assumption/question: Are there some SAP-specific rules for XSLT or XPath I need to follow? I would say so, because it works outside of SAP. I tried to find any solution for this, but without success.

Thanks in advance and kind regards

[Former Member]

Got it:

...
<ACTIONDETAILS>
   <xsl:for-each select="actionDetails/row">
         <ACTIONDETAIL>
           <TYPE>              <xsl:value-of select="type"/>               </TYPE>
          ...
          </ACTIONDETAIL>
   </xsl:for-each>
</ACTIONDETAILS>

For creating data for an internal table, I needed a parent node <ACTIONDETAILS> to add a collection of child elements <ACTIONDETAIL>.

I still can't explain though why it validated in both an online validator and the XSLT tester in SAP.

[Sandra_Rossi]

Please close the question.

PS: from the XML point of view, it's not an error to not have <ACTIONDETAILS>. But you must have it because of ABAP, containing the name of the internal table (by the way you didn't show the description of your target ABAP variable): <ITABNAME><xsl:for-each ...><item>...</item></xsl-for-each></ITABNAME> (name "item" may vary depending on the rule explained in asXML - Mapping of Internal Tables).