i think i found a way to accomplish what i want, but the xpath function is not working like i thought it would.<xsl:value-of select="substring('pubDate',1,15)" /> is returning the string pubDate instead of the first 15 characters of a xml pubDate value: Thu, 01 Jun 2006 15:45:00 EDTwhat is the correct xpath function to display Thu, 01 Jun 2006 15:45:00 EDT as Thu, 01 Jun 2006?