How to iterate through DOM elements that match a css class using xpath?

Question

I'm processing an HTML page with a variable number of p elements with a css class "myclass", using Python + Selenium RC.

When I try to select each node with this xpath:

//p[@class='myclass'][n]

(with n a natural number)

I get only the first p element with this css class for every n, unlike the situation if I iterate through selecting ALL p elements with:

//p[n]

Is there any way I can iterate through elements by css class using xpath?

Answer 1

XPath 1.0 doesn't provide an iterating construct.

Iteration can be performed on the selected node-set in the language that is hosting XPath.

Examples:

In XSLT 1.0:

   <xsl:for-each select="someExpressionSelectingNodes">
     <!-- Do something with the current node -->
   </xsl:for-each>

In C#:

using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Xml;

public class Sample {

  public static void Main() {

    XmlDocument doc = new XmlDocument();
    doc.Load("booksort.xml");

    XmlNodeList nodeList;
    XmlNode root = doc.DocumentElement;

    nodeList=root.SelectNodes("descendant::book[author/last-name='Austen']");

    //Change the price on the books.
    foreach (XmlNode book in nodeList)
    {
      book.LastChild.InnerText="15.95";
    }

    Console.WriteLine("Display the modified XML document....");
    doc.Save(Console.Out);

  }
}

XPath 2.0 has its own iteration construct:

   for $varname1 in someExpression1,
       $varname2 in someExpression2, 
      .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .
       $varnameN in someExpressionN 
    return
        SomeExpressionUsingTheVarsAbove