IBM BPM, V8.0.1, All platforms > Authoring services in Integration Designer > Services and service-related functions > Building mediation flows > Create XPath expressions
XPath
The XML Path Language (XPath) is a language used to uniquely identify or address parts of an XML document. An XPath expression can be used to search through an XML document, and extract information from the nodes (any part of the document, such as an element or attribute) in it. XPath can be used alone or in conjunction with XSLT.
Most mediation primitives have properties that are specified using an XPath 1.0 expression; for example the message logger's root property takes an XPath 1.0 expression which specifies the part of the message that is available to the primitive for processing. You can also use an XPath 1.0 expression to identify one or more fields in a message, and use these fields to filter or select by specifying a value.
When you are setting properties for mediation primitives, you can use the XPath Expression builder to visually build your XPath Expression. The expression builder is available from the properties page of those primitives that take XPath expressions as properties.
If you are in a field which accepts an XPath expression, you can press Control+Space to get code-assist. This will provide you with available XPath functions and operators for your expression. For more information about using XPath 1.0 see the following websites:
http://www.w3.org/TR/xpath - Information about XPath 1.0
- http://www.w3schools.com/xpath/default.asp - W3 Tutorial on XPath 1.0
- http://www.ibm.com/developerworks - IBM DeveloperWorks articles. Use the search box to find topics on XPath 1.0