Well, it sounds like "the parser" isn't schema compliant. In which case the same would be true for the strings within the <nonSort> element. So this whole nonSort thing really doesn't work. In which case, we should go with Roy's solution, even though that's not how MARC does it. kc On Fri, 2004-01-23 at 07:30, Andrew E Switala wrote: > Whitespace normalization is done at the level of the XML parser, so by > the time schema validation happens the attributes have already been > normalized. > > >>> [log in to unmask] 2004-01-23 10:20:12 >>> > You should be able to define them as xs:string, in which case white > space is retained. Well, in theory, anyway. -- ------------------------------------- Karen Coyle Digital Library Specialist http://www.kcoyle.net Ph: 510-540-7596 Fax: 510-848-3913 --------------------------------------