DOM XML: An Alternative to Expat Page 5

A Longer Example

Here is a longer example of how to extract info from an xml doc. For example,
we have a file called employees.xml containing employee entries.

<?xml version="1.0"?>

<employees company="zoomedia.com">
	<employee>
		<name>Matt</name>
		<position type="contract">Web Guy</position>
	</employee>

	<employee>
		<name>George</name>
		<position type="full time">Mad Hacker</position>
	</employee>

	<employee>
		<name>Wookie</name>
		<position type="part time">Hairy SysAdmin</position>
	</employee>
</employees>

Here’s how you would extract this info in your php script.

<?php
# iterate through an array of nodes
# looking for a text node
# return its content
function get_content($parent)
{
    $nodes = $parent->children();
    while($node = array_shift($nodes))
        if ($node->type == XML_TEXT_NODE)
            return $node->content;
    return "";
}
# get the content of a particular node
function find_content($parent,$name)
{
    $nodes = $parent->children();
    while($node = array_shift($nodes))
        if ($node->name == $name)
            return get_content($node);
    return "";
}
# get an attribute from a particular node
function find_attr($parent,$name,$attr)
{
    $nodes = $parent->children();
    while($node = array_shift($nodes))
        if ($node->name == $name)
            return $node->getattr($attr);
    return "";
}
# load xml doc
$doc = xmldocfile("employees.xml") or die("What employees?");
# get root Node (employees)
$root = $doc->root();
# get an array of employees' children
# that is each employee node
$employees = $root->children();
# shift through the array 
# and print out some employee data
while($employee = array_shift($employees))
{
    if ($employee->type == XML_TEXT_NODE)
        continue;
    $name = find_content($employee,"name");
    $pos = find_content($employee,"position");
    $type = find_attr($employee,"position","type");
    echo "$name the $pos, $type employee<br>";
}
?>

You should see the following in your browser.

Matt the Web Guy, contract employee
George the Mad Hacker, full time employee
Wookie the Hairy SysAdmin, part time employee