SAXONICA

Saxon Documentation
Full Contents
About Saxon
Changes in this Release
Conditions of Use
Using XSLT 2.0
Using XQuery
Handling Source Documents
XML Schema Processing
The XPath API
Saxon on .NET
Extensibility
Saxon Extensions
| Introduction
| EXSLT Extensions
| Extension attributes (XSLT only)
| Additional serialization parameters
| Extension functions
» | Extension instructions
Sample Saxon Applications
The Saxon SQL Extension
XSLT Elements
XPath 2.0 Expression Syntax
Function Library
Standards Conformance

# Extension instructions

A Saxon extension instruction is invoked using a name such as `<saxon:localname>`.

The `saxon` prefix (or whatever prefix you choose to use) must be associated with the Saxon namespace URI `http://saxon.sf.net/`. The prefix must also be designated as an extension element prefix by including it in the `extension-element-prefixes` attribute on the `xsl:stylesheet` element, or the `xsl:extension-element-prefixes` attribute on any enclosing literal result element or extension element.

However, top-level elements such as `saxon:collation` and `saxon:script` can be used without designating the prefix as an extension element prefix.

The extension instructions and declarations are:

- saxon:assign: assigns a new value to a global variable

- saxon:call-template: calls a template whose name is decided at run-time

- saxon:collation: names and describes a collating sequence

- saxon:doctype: constructs a serialized DOCTYPE declaration

- saxon:import-query: imports functions from an XQuery library module

- saxon:entity-ref: creates an entity reference in the serialized output

- saxon:script: declares an extension function

- saxon:while: iterates until a condition becomes false

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