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# XPath Introduction * * * XPath is a language for finding information in XML documents. * * * ## Prerequisites for Learning: Before you continue, you should have a basic understanding of the following: * HTML / XHTML * XML / XML Namespaces If you want to learn these topics first, please visit our (#) for these tutorials. * * * ## What is XPath? * XPath uses path expressions to navigate in XML documents * XPath contains a standard function library * XPath is a major element in XSLT * XPath is a W3C standard * * * ## XPath Path Expressions XPath uses path expressions to select nodes or node-sets in an XML document. These path expressions look very similar to what you see in a regular computer file system. * * * ## XPath Standard Functions XPath contains over 100 built-in functions. These functions are used for string values, numeric values, date and time comparisons, node and QName processing, sequence processing, logical values, and more. * * * ## XPath is Used in XSLT XPath is a major element in the XSLT standard. Without XPath knowledge, you cannot create XSLT documents. You can read more about XSLT in our (#). XQuery and XPointer are both built on XPath expressions. XQuery 1.0 and XPath 2.0 share the same data model and support the same functions and operators. You can read more about XQuery in our (#). * * * ## XPath is a W3C Standard XPath became a W3C standard on November 16, 1999. XPath was designed to be used by XSLT, XPointer, and other XML parsing software. You can read more about the XPath standard in our (#). [](#)(#) (#)[](#)