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ElementCount

property ElementCount: Integer read;

Example​

procedure ReadLastElement(Node: TXMLNode);
var
  LastElement: TXMLNode;
begin
  if (Node = nil) or (Node.ElementCount = 0) then Exit;
  LastElement := Node.Elements[Node.ElementCount - 1];
end;

Usage​

ElementCount returns the number of immediate Velox element children after filtering attributes, text and other raw node kinds.

Additional Technical Info​

ElementCount scans a concrete container's immediate child list and counts objects whose native runtime class is TsdElement. It does not recurse.

Attributes, character data, whitespace, comments, CDATA, declarations, DTD nodes and processing instructions do not count. DTD element declarations are structural TsdDtdElement nodes, not ordinary TsdElement objects, so they are excluded despite their similar name.

Use the zero-based Elements property for indices from 0 through ElementCount - 1. This filtered index is not the raw node-list index returned by NodeAdd, because raw nodes can occur between elements.

Non-container node kinds use the base implementation and return zero. A zero result can therefore mean an empty element, a container with only non-element content, or a non-container node. Check ElementType if that distinction matters.

The result is recalculated on every read by scanning relevant immediate nodes; it is not a stable snapshot. Structural mutation changes it immediately. Reading it inside a loop condition repeatedly rescans the list, so cache the count when the tree will not change and the list is large.

The property has no side effect and returns no owned object.

The example is source-reviewed only; no element was read.

External references

Created 2026-07-15