Searching for the first matching element after a specific node (XPath and ITunes XML)

Question

it's not nessesary to post my full code because I have just a short questions. I'm searching with XPath in a XML Doc for a text Value. I have a XML Like

<key>Name</key>
<string>Dat Ass</string> 
<key>Artist</key>
<string>Earl Sweatshirt</string> 
<key>Album</key>
<string>Kitchen Cutlery</string> 
<key>Kind</key>
<string>MPEG-Audiodatei</string>

I have an Expression like this:

//string[preceding-sibling::key[text()[contains(., 'Name')]]]/text()

but this gives me ALL following string-tags, I just want the first one with the Song-Title.

greets Alex

Answer 1

Use:

(//string[preceding-sibling::key[1] = 'Name'])[1]/text()

Alternatively, one can use a forward-only expression:

(//key[. = 'Name'])[1]/following-sibling::string[1]/text()

Do note:

This is a common error. Any expression of the kind:

//someExpr[1]

Doesn't select "the first node in the document from all nodes selected by //someExpr". In fact it can select many nodes.

The above expression selects any node that is selected by //someExpr and that is the first such child of its parent.

This is why, without brackets, the other answer to this question is generally incorrect.