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<title>The XPath Context</title>
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<td valign="top" class="NAME" colspan="2">The XPath Context</td>
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<!--<primary>context</primary>
  <secondary>XPath</secondary>-->
<!--<primary>XPath</primary>
  <secondary>context</secondary>-->


The context in an XPath expression consists of several things:</p>
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Context node
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<!--<primary>context node</primary>-->
The node currently being evaluated.
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Context position
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<!--<primary>context position</primary>-->
A nonzero positive integer that indicates the position of the context node within the set of context nodes.
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Context size
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<!--<primary>context size</primary>-->
A nonzero positive integer that indicates the number of nodes in the current context.
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Variable bindings
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<!--<primary>variable bindings</primary>-->
<!--<primary>variables</primary>
  <secondary>set of (context)</secondary>-->
A set of variables that are in scope for the current context. Each one is represented by a variable name and an object that represents its value. The object might be one of the four XPath datatypes, some additional type defined by an extension, or some other entity.
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Functions
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<!--<primary>functions</primary>
  <secondary>set of (context)</secondary>-->
A set of functions visible to the current context. Each function is represented by a mapping between a function name and the actual code to be invoked. Each function takes zero or more arguments and returns a single result. XPath defines a number of core functions that are always available; XSLT defines additional functions that go beyond those defined in the XPath specification.
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Namespace declarations
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<!--<primary>namespace declarations, set of (context)</primary>-->
The set of namespace declarations visible to the current context. Each one consists of a namespace prefix and the URI with which it is associated.
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