javascriptxmlxmlwriter

Create XML in JavaScript

Is it possible to create an XML file with some data in JavaScript? I have the data stored in variables.

I've googled around a bit and it doesn't seem like it's talked about much. I thought I could use XMLWriter such as this:

var XML = new XMLWriter();
XML.BeginNode ("testing");
XML.Node("testingOne");
XML.Node("TestingTwo");
XML.Node("TestingThree");
XML.EndNode();

as stated in this tutorial: EHow Tutorial

However, when I execute this code, I get the following error:

ReferenceError: XMLWriter is not defined

How can I solve this error?

Solution

  • Disclaimer: The following answer assumes that you are using the JavaScript environment of a web browser.

    JavaScript handles XML with 'XML DOM objects'. You can obtain such an object in three ways:

    1. Creating a new XML DOM object

    var xmlDoc = document.implementation.createDocument(null, "books");

    The first argument can contain the namespace URI of the document to be created, if the document belongs to one.

    Source: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/DOMImplementation/createDocument

    2. Fetching an XML file with XMLHttpRequest

    var xhttp = new XMLHttpRequest();
xhttp.onreadystatechange = function() {
if (xhttp.readyState == 4 && xhttp.status == 200) {

    var xmlDoc = xhttp.responseXML; //important to use responseXML here
}
xhttp.open("GET", "books.xml", true);
xhttp.send();

    3. Parsing a string containing serialized XML

    var xmlString = "<root></root>";
var parser = new DOMParser();
var xmlDoc = parser.parseFromString(xmlString, "text/xml"); //important to use "text/xml"

    When you have obtained an XML DOM object, you can use methods to manipulate it like

    var node = xmlDoc.createElement("heyHo");
var elements = xmlDoc.getElementsByTagName("root");
elements[0].appendChild(node);

    For a full reference, see http://www.w3schools.com/xml/dom_intro.asp

    Note: It is important, that you don't use the methods provided by the document namespace, i. e.

    var node = document.createElement("Item");

    This will create HTML nodes instead of XML nodes and will result in a node with lower-case tag names. XML tag names are case-sensitive in contrast to HTML tag names.

    You can serialize XML DOM objects like this:

    var serializer = new XMLSerializer();
var xmlString = serializer.serializeToString(xmlDoc);