embedding xml in xml as string

[shaun roe]

I have an xml format for creating a database; lets say a fragment looks
like this:

<insertValue type="int">7</insert>
<insertValue type="string">H ello everyone</insert>
now I have a document I am transforming into this format using XSLT:

<nDwarves>7</nDwarves>
<snowWhiteSays> Hello everyone</snowWhiteSays>
<groupReply><po ssibleReplies replyTo="greeti ng">hello</possibleReplies >
<possibleReplie s replyTo="workSi gnal">hi ho, hi ho</possibleReplies >
</groupReply>
My problem is that I want to put the entire contents of the <groupReply>
node into a string, escaping the "<" and ">", so that I have an
insertValue node containing the string which is essentially a bit of
escaped xml.

Unfortunately, <xsl:copy-of... > doesnt have an option to escape the xml
characters, so far as I can see. Is there another way?
background:
why do this?
I am using the Xerces2.3 parser to get the text content of the
<insertValue> nodes, then I upload it. If I have straight xml inside
this node, then getTextContent simply returns the collapsed text content
of all the child elements * with no element names etc, when what I want
is the actual xml fragment to insert in my database as a string. I hope
to get around this by escaping the xml, so it really looks like just
another string.

[shaun roe]

In article
<sh************ *************** **@news-reader.wanadoop ortails.com>,
shaun roe <sh*******@wana doo.fr> wrote:

it probably bad form to answer your own question, but I think this will
do it:

<!-- serializing the embedded xml into a string -->
<xsl:template name="serialize ">
<xsl:param name="nodeset"/>
<!-- openstarttag, openendtag, closetag markers, and close empty tag
marker -->
<xsl:variable name="ot" select="'&lt;'"/>
<xsl:variable name="oet" select="'&lt;/'"/>
<xsl:variable name="ct" select="'&gt;'"/>
<xsl:variable name="cet" select="'/&gt;'"/>
<xsl:for-each select="$nodese t">
<xsl:variable name="n" select="name()"/>
<xsl:variable name="value" select=".[not(./*)]"/>
<xsl:variable name="attribute s">
<xsl:for-each select="./@*">
<xsl:call-template name="serialize Attribute"/>
</xsl:for-each>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="empty(.)" >
<xsl:value-of select="concat( $ot,$n,$attribu tes,$cet,$LF)"/>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwis e>
<xsl:value-of select="concat( $ot,$n,$attribu tes,$ct,$value) "/>
<xsl:call-template name="serialize ">
<xsl:with-param name="nodeset" select="./*"/>
</xsl:call-template>
<xsl:value-of select="concat( $oet,$n,$ct,$LF )"/>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:for-each>
</xsl:template>
<!--serialize one attribute -->
<xsl:template name="serialize Attribute">
<xsl:variable name="q" select="'&quot; '"/>
<xsl:variable name="an" select="name()"/>
<xsl:variable name="av" select="."/>
<xsl:value-of select="concat( ' ',$an,'=',$q,$a v,$q)"/>
</xsl:template>