Preserve HTML elements in XSLT 1.0 - xslt

Question

Given the following XML:
<application>
<documentation>Before text.
[This|http://google.com] is a link.
Click [here|http://google.com] for another link.
After text.
</documentation>
</application>
I want to replace new lines with <br/> tags and create links. The outcome should produce the following HTML:
Before text.<br/>
This is a link.<br/>
Click here for another link.<br/>
After text.
I have the XSLT below with the appropriate templates. My problem is that the <br/> elements added by the first function are stripped out by the second function. I've tried using an identity transform, but I can't wrap my head around it.
Any help would be appreciated.
My current XSLT:
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
<xsl:output method="html" version="1.0"/>
<xsl:template match="application">
<p>
<xsl:variable name="with_new_lines">
<xsl:call-template name="replace-newlines">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="documentation"/>
<xsl:with-param name="replace" select="'
'"/>
<xsl:with-param name="by" select="'new_line'"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name="with_links">
<xsl:call-template name="create-links">
<xsl:with-param name="text">
<xsl:copy-of select="$with_new_lines"/>
</xsl:with-param>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:copy-of select="$with_links"/>
</p>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template name="replace-newlines">
<xsl:param name="text"/>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($text, '
')">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($text,'
')"/>
<br/>
<xsl:call-template name="replace-newlines">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="substring-after($text,'
')"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<xsl:copy-of select="$text"/>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
<!-- Changing [here|http://a.com] to hereand
[http://a.com] to http://a.com-->
<xsl:template match="*" name="create-links">
<xsl:param name="text" select="."/>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($text, 'http')">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($text,'[')"/>
<xsl:variable name="the_link_and_after">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($text,'[')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name="the_link">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($the_link_and_after,']')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($the_link,'|')">
<xsl:variable name="the_url">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($the_link,'|')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<a href="{$the_url}">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($the_link,'|')"/>
</a>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<a href="{$the_link}">
<xsl:copy-of select="$the_link"/>
</a>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
<!--<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($text,']')" />-->
<xsl:call-template name="create-links">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="substring-after($text,']')"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<xsl:copy-of select="$text"/>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>

Answer 1

The problem with your approach is that each of your named templates creates a result-tree-fragment, containing a mixture of text nodes and elements (either <br> or <a>). When you send the result to be processed as a string by the other template, only the text nodes survive the treatment.
I would suggest you start by tokenizing the input into lines as elements. Then send each line in turn to be processed by the other template:
XSLT 1.0
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
xmlns:exsl="http://exslt.org/common"
extension-element-prefixes="exsl">
<xsl:output method="html" encoding="utf-8"/>
<xsl:template match="application">
<xsl:variable name="lines">
<xsl:call-template name="tokenize-lines">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="documentation"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:variable>
<p>
<xsl:for-each select="exsl:node-set($lines)/line">
<xsl:call-template name="create-links">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="."/>
</xsl:call-template>
<br/>
</xsl:for-each>
</p>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template name="tokenize-lines">
<xsl:param name="text"/>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($text, '
')">
<line><xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($text,'
')"/></line>
<xsl:call-template name="tokenize-lines">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="substring-after($text,'
')"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<line><xsl:copy-of select="$text"/></line>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template name="create-links">
<xsl:param name="text"/>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($text, 'http')">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($text,'[')"/>
<xsl:variable name="the_link_and_after">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($text,'[')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name="the_link">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($the_link_and_after,']')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($the_link,'|')">
<xsl:variable name="the_url">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($the_link,'|')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<a href="{$the_url}">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($the_link,'|')"/>
</a>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<a href="{$the_link}">
<xsl:copy-of select="$the_link"/>
</a>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
<!--<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($text,']')" />-->
<xsl:call-template name="create-links">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="substring-after($text,']')"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<xsl:copy-of select="$text"/>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
Alternatively, you could call the 2nd template from within the 1st one, for each line separately before returning it:
XSLT 1.0
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
<xsl:output method="html" encoding="utf-8"/>
<xsl:template match="application">
<p>
<xsl:call-template name="create-lines">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="documentation"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</p>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template name="create-lines">
<xsl:param name="text"/>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($text, '
')">
<xsl:call-template name="create-links">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="substring-before($text,'
')"/>
</xsl:call-template>
<br/>
<xsl:call-template name="create-lines">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="substring-after($text,'
')"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<xsl:call-template name="create-links">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="$text"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template name="create-links">
<xsl:param name="text"/>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($text, 'http')">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($text,'[')"/>
<xsl:variable name="the_link_and_after">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($text,'[')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name="the_link">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($the_link_and_after,']')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($the_link,'|')">
<xsl:variable name="the_url">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($the_link,'|')"/>
</xsl:variable>
<a href="{$the_url}">
<xsl:copy-of select="substring-before($the_link,'|')"/>
</a>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<a href="{$the_link}">
<xsl:copy-of select="$the_link"/>
</a>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
<!--<xsl:copy-of select="substring-after($text,']')" />-->
<xsl:call-template name="create-links">
<xsl:with-param name="text" select="substring-after($text,']')"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<xsl:copy-of select="$text"/>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>