fn:substring

fn:substring(
    $sourceString as xs:string?, 
    $start as xs:double
) as xs:string

fn:substring(
    $sourceString as xs:string?, 
    $start as xs:double, 
    $length as xs:double
) as xs:string

This function is deterministic, context-independent, and focus-independent.

If the value of $sourceString is the empty sequence, the function returns the zero-length string.

Otherwise, the function returns a string comprising those characters of $sourceString whose index position (counting from one) is greater than or equal to the value of $start (rounded to an integer), and (if $length is specified) less than the sum of $start and $length (both rounded to integers).

The characters returned do not extend beyond $sourceString. If $start is zero or negative, only those characters in positions greater than zero are returned.

More specifically, the three argument version of the function returns the characters in $sourceString whose position $p satisfies:

fn:round($start) <= $p and $p < fn:round($start) + fn:round($length)

The two argument version of the function assumes that $length is infinite and thus returns the characters in $sourceString whose position $p satisfies:

fn:round($start) <= $p

In the above computations, the rules for op:numeric-less-than and op:numeric-greater-than apply.

The first character of a string is located at position 1, not position 0.

The second and third arguments allow xs:double values (rather than requiring xs:integer) in order to achieve compatibility with XPath 1.0.

A surrogate pair counts as one character, not two.

The consequences of supplying values such as NaN or positive or negative infinity for the $start or $length arguments follow from the above rules, and are not always intuitive.

The expression fn:substring("motor car", 6) returns " car". (Characters starting at position 6 to the end of $sourceString are selected.)

The expression fn:substring("metadata", 4, 3) returns "ada". (Characters at positions greater than or equal to 4 and less than 7 are selected.)

The expression fn:substring("12345", 1.5, 2.6) returns "234". (Characters at positions greater than or equal to 2 and less than 5 are selected.)

The expression fn:substring("12345", 0, 3) returns "12". (Characters at positions greater than or equal to 0 and less than 3 are selected. Since the first position is 1, these are the characters at positions 1 and 2.)

The expression fn:substring("12345", 5, -3) returns "". (Characters at positions greater than or equal to 5 and less than 2 are selected.)

The expression fn:substring("12345", -3, 5) returns "1". (Characters at positions greater than or equal to -3 and less than 2 are selected. Since the first position is 1, this is the character at position 1.)

The expression fn:substring("12345", 0 div 0E0, 3) returns "". (Since 0 div 0E0 returns NaN, and NaN compared to any other number returns false, no characters are selected.)

The expression fn:substring("12345", 1, 0 div 0E0) returns "". (As above.)

The expression fn:substring((), 1, 3) returns "".

The expression fn:substring("12345", -42, 1 div 0E0) returns "12345". (Characters at positions greater than or equal to -42 and less than INF are selected.)

The expression fn:substring("12345", -1 div 0E0, 1 div 0E0) returns "". (Since the value of -INF + INF is NaN, no characters are selected.)