XPath: what does "namespace" axis mean?

Question

XPath

Good afternoon!
Can you please explain what the "namespace" axis means?
The official documentation defines it as: Selects all nodes in the namespace of the current node .
Please explain what this means and give an example.
Thank you!

Answer 1

Namespaces are needed to resolve tag name conflicts in xml.
For example, organizations and their clients

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<root xmlns:company="http://example.com/company" xmlns:customer="http://example.com/customer">
  <company:company>
    <company:name>ACME</company:name>
    <customer:name>Vasya</customer:name>
    <customer:name>Tom</customer:name>
  </company:company>
  <company:company>
    <company:name>Scrooge McDuck Inc</company:name>
    <customer:name>Mary</customer:name>
    <customer:name>Bob</customer:name>
    <customer:name>Rob</customer:name>
  </company:company>
</root>

All organizations:
All clients:
All clients of the organization:
All client organizations:

//company:company[customer:name = 'Vasya']/company:name