get-collection-size() vs size() in LiveCycle

Just a note to be careful when using the XPath expressions get-collection-size() and size() in LiveCycle to count the number of elements in a list variable. If your list is empty the two functions will not return the same value

Creating a test process to demonstrate this I added three variables:

• lstTestList


• intCountList -> count(/process_data/lstTestList)


• intCollectSizeList -> get-collection-size(/process_data/lstTestList)

Running this process on an empty list gives the following output:

• intCountList -> 1


• intCollectSizeList -> 0

So if trying to find out whether or not a list is empty use get-collection-size() and not count()