XML Tutorial/XPath/descendant

descendant axis selects the child nodes of the context node, the child nodes of those child nodes, and so on.

File: Data.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<data>    
        <AAA id="a1" pos="start">
      <BBB id="b1"/>
      <BBB id="b2"/>
    </AAA>
    <AAA id="a2">
      <BBB id="b3"/>
      <BBB id="b4"/>
      <CCC id="c1">
        <CCC id="c2"/>
      </CCC>
      <BBB id="b5">
        <CCC id="c3"/>
      </BBB>
    </AAA>
</data>
File: Transform.xslt
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet
      version="1.0"
      xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
    <xsl:template match="/">
      <table border="1" cellpadding="6">
        <tr>
          <td colspan="2">Axis: descendant</td>
        </tr>
        <tr>
          <td>Element</td>
          <td>Node-set</td>
        </tr>
        <xsl:for-each select="/source//*">
          <xsl:call-template name="print"/>
        </xsl:for-each>
      </table>
    </xsl:template>
    <xsl:template name="print">
      <tr>
        <td>
          <xsl:value-of select="name()"/>
          <xsl:text> id = </xsl:text>
          <xsl:value-of select="./@id"/>
        </td>
        <td>
          <xsl:for-each select="descendant::*">
            <xsl:value-of select="./@id"/>
            <xsl:text/>
          </xsl:for-each>
        </td>
      </tr>
    </xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
Output:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><table border="1" cellpadding="6"><tr><th colspan="2">Axis: descendant</th></tr><tr><td>Element</th><td>Node-set</th></tr></table>

lists all children of each element in the source

File: Data.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<data>
    <AAA>
      <BBB id="b1">
        <CCC name="q" size="12"/>
        <EEE id="e1">
          <SSS/>
        </EEE>
        <CCC weight="45"/>
        <CCC/>
      </BBB>
    </AAA>
    <AAA>
      <EEE id="e2"/>
      <CCC>
        <DDD/>
        <DDD/>
      </CCC>
    </AAA>
</data>
File: Transform.xslt
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet
      version="1.0"
      xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
    <xsl:template match="/">
      <xsl:for-each select="/descendant::*">
        <xsl:variable name="pos" select="position()"/>
        <xsl:variable name="name" select="name()"/>
        <xsl:if test="not(/descendant::*[position() &lt; $pos and name()= $name])">
          <Paragraph>
            <xsl:value-of select="$name"/>
            <xsl:text> [</xsl:text>
            <xsl:for-each select="//*[name()=$name]/*">
              <xsl:variable name="p" select="position()"/>
              <xsl:if test="not(//*[name()=$name]/*[position()&lt; $p and name()=name(current())])">
                <xsl:value-of select="name()"/>
                <xsl:text>, </xsl:text>
              </xsl:if>
            </xsl:for-each>
            <xsl:text>]</xsl:text>
          </Paragraph>
        </xsl:if>
      </xsl:for-each>
    </xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
Output:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><Paragraph>data [AAA, ]</Paragraph><Paragraph>AAA [BBB, ]</Paragraph><Paragraph>BBB [CCC, EEE, ]</Paragraph><Paragraph>CCC [DDD, ]</Paragraph><Paragraph>EEE [SSS, ]</Paragraph><Paragraph>SSS []</Paragraph><Paragraph>DDD []</Paragraph>