specifying-an-axis-sqlxml-4-0.md

title	Specifying an Axis (SQLXML 4.0) | Microsoft Docs
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ms.date	03/04/2017
ms.prod	sql-server-2016
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ms.technology	dbe-xml
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ms.topic	reference
helpviewer_keywords	XPath queries [SQLXML], axes XPath queries [SQLXML], location paths self axis attribute axis [SQLXML] axis [SQLXML] child axis parent axis location path for XPath query axes [SQLXML]
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author	douglaslMS
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Specifying an Axis (SQLXML 4.0)

• The axis specifies the tree relationship between the nodes selected by the location step and the context node. The following axes are supported: child

  Contains the child of the context node.

  The following XPath expression (location path) selects from the current context node all the <Customer> children:

  child::Customer  
  

  In the following XPath query, child is the axis. Customer is the node test.

• parent

  Contains the parent of the context node.

  The following XPath expression selects all the <Customer> parents of the <Order> children:

  child::Customer/child::Order[parent::Customer/@customerID="ALFKI"]  
  

  This is the same as specifying child::Customer. In this XPath query, child and parent are the axes. Customer and Order are the node tests.

• attribute

  Contains the attribute of the context node.

  The following XPath expression selects the CustomerID attribute of the context node:

  attribute::CustomerID  
  

• self

  Contains the context node itself.

  The following XPath expression selects the current node if it is the <Order> node:

  self::Order  
  

  In this XPath query, self is the axis and Order is the node test.