I might not be reading the scenario correctly. Let me start over. Let's assume that the info to which you want to refer is called "Browse" and it is in some other area of your document, as an individual <choice> element within a <choices> element. I noticed that, at least with my setup (DITA 1.3 FM 2017), a <choice> element automatically gets a <p> element assigned. So I might have steered you a bit wrong with the <ph> element, and I apologize for that. You have assigned an id to that element, so in the end it all looks like this: <choices><choice id="foo"><p>Browse</p></choice></choices> That should be all you need at this end of the cross-reference. Now, elsewhere in your document, you want to xref to this <choice> element. Looking at it this way, I think your problem might be that the location where you want to put the xref might be invalid in the structure. Let's say it's a <choice> element again, which cannot contain an <xref> element, because that is invalid structure. <xref> is invalid for a lot of elements, and you won't see the <xref> element as an option when it's not valid at your current location. So what you're trying to do is something like this (which is invalid): <xref><choice>...</choice></xref> And what I originally meant is that you should try is something like this: <choice><ph><xref></xref></ph></choice> (edited this because I did it incorrectly before) This was assuming that there isn't already another valid element like <p> inside the <choice> element. If that's the case, you can wrap the <xref> element around that instead. What helps me a lot is to work with the Element Boundaries turned on so I can quickly see what elements are in use. Here's an example with element boundaries on. I assigned an id to the <choice>Here is some text</choice> element, and successfully put in the <xref> right below it, as the <cmd> element is a valid place for an <xref> element. Where <cmd> not valid for an xref, but I still wanted to put one there, I could use the <ph> element. I hope this helps. Sorry for the earlier confusion. edit to add: Here's an example using the <ph> element:
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