error: param value not a node-set

Hi there,
I am new to the forum, but have been reading some posts and it look like a greta XML resource.
I have a question that I cannot seem to answer.
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
xmlns:msxml="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt" version="1.0">
<xsl

utput method="html" media-type="text/html"/>
<xsl

aram name="total"/>

<xsl:template match="/">
<html><body><table><xsl:apply-templates select="//TITLE"/></table></body></html>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="TITLE">
<xsl:for-each select=".">
<tr><td><xsl:number/></td><td><xsl:value-of select="count ($total)"/></td></tr>
</xsl:for-each>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
Using Saxon processor at the command prompt I am passing a an absolute path with a param value by typing
Saxon artists.xml artists.xsl total=/catalog/cd
and getting an error telling me that value of my parameter ($select) is not a node-set. If I add a default value to the param in the stylesheet, there is no problem, but when I try to pass one in externally , the error occurs.
What is my problem? Thanks in advance....Scott

count() accept a node-set as a parameter, and when you pass something into stylesheet, it is passed as a string. There is no conversion from string to node-set

so
<xsl:someElement select="$variable"...
gives an error.
Idiomatic workaround is:
<xsl:someElement select="*[name(.) = $variable]" ...
But I am not sure it will work when the path is included.
Another variant, recommended by Michael Kay, Saxon�s author, is to use evaluate() extension function which takes a string with an XPath expression and evaluates it.

Thanks Mapraputa, that saves me alot of time and frustration.