CODEWITHSUNDEEP
xmlcdata
u123
u123

Reputation: 16331

Nesting xml/CDATA into a xml file?

I need to put a rather large xml file into another xml file. I considered using CDATA for this:

http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/REC-xml-20001006#sec-cdata-sect http://www.w3schools.com/xml/xml_cdata.asp

but since my xml might also contain CDATA this does not work unless I do some nasty workaround:

http://web-design.blogs.webucator.com/2010/11/20/nesting-cdata-blocks/

Are there better ways of transferring/encoding large nested xml files or is the xml format simply not meant to be used in this way?

Upvotes: 2

Views: 9096

Answers (5)

TeChn4K
TeChn4K

Reputation: 2405

First XML :

<root>
    <data1 value="test1" />
    <data2>
        <value>test2</value>
    </data2>
</root>

Second XML :

<root2>
    <data3 value="test3" />
    <data4>
        <value>test4</value>
    </data2>
</root2>

You can include second XML in first with a specific node :

<root>
    <data1 value="test1" />
    <data2>
        <value>test2</value>
    </data2>
    <dataFromSecondXML>
        <data3 value="test3" />
        <data4>
            <value>test4</value>
        </data2>
    </dataFromSecondXML>
</root>

Upvotes: 2

Shai Ben-Yehuda
Shai Ben-Yehuda

Reputation: 144

you can replace the inner ]] with ]]]]><![CDATA[

(based on http://web-design.blogs.webucator.com/2010/11/20/nesting-cdata-blocks/ )

Example: We have outer and inner docs and we want to put the inner inside the outer as CDATA.

<outer>
  <e1 name="abc"/>
  <innerDoc><![CDATA[
      <Doc1/>
    ]]></innerDoc>
</outer>

<inner>
  <innrer1/>
  <a><![CDATA[
      free text with << >
    ]]></a>
  <innrer2/>
</inner>

if we just copy and paste we get an invalid xml

<outer>
  <e1 name="abc"/>
  <innerDoc><![CDATA[
      <inner>
        <innrer1/>
        <a><![CDATA[
            free text with << >
          ]]></a>
        <innrer2/>
      </inner>
    ]]></innerDoc>
</outer>

however, if we replace the inner ]] with ]]]]><![CDATA[ before embedding it we fix the problem

<outer>
  <e1 name="abc"/>
  <innerDoc><![CDATA[
      <inner>
        <innrer1/>
        <a><![CDATA[
            free text with << >
          ]]]]><![CDATA[></a>
        <innrer2/>
      </inner>
    ]]></innerDoc>
</outer>

Upvotes: 5

Michael Kay
Michael Kay

Reputation: 163458

XML is hierarchic: why can't you nest the documents directly, without CDATA? Apart from DTD issues, any XML document can be copied as the content of an element in another document.

Upvotes: 1

Max
Max

Reputation: 2131

The short answer is that XML is not meant to be used in this way!

However, if you base64-encode the XML file to be packaged, the encoded result will not contain any characters which might be interpreted either as markup, or as entity references, and can safely be held as the contents of a text node.

Upvotes: 0

William Walseth
William Walseth

Reputation: 2923

Yes, in your top-most document make the CDATA section of data type bin.base64. That way even if the document you're wrapping contains a CDATA section, you're protected. As an added bonus, your application will also support binary files (images, spreadsheets, etc.).

Here's some code that does it, based on Microsoft ADO, and MSXML.

function wrapBinaryFile( strFileName)
{
    var ado_stream = new ActiveXObject("ADODB.Stream");
    var xml = newXMLDocument();
    xml.loadXML("<file/>");
    xml.documentElement.setAttribute( "name", strFileName );

    xml.documentElement.setAttribute("xmlns:dt","urn:schemas-microsoft-com:datatypes");

    xml.documentElement.dataType = "bin.base64";
    ado_stream.Type = 1; // 1=adTypeBinary
    ado_stream.Open();
    ado_stream.LoadFromFile( strFileName );
    xml.documentElement.nodeTypedValue = ado_stream.Read(-1); // -1=adReadAll
    ado_stream.Close();
    return xml;
}

And how to un-wrap it on the other end...

function unwrapBinaryFile(ndFile, strFileName )
{
    var ado_stream = new ActiveXObject("ADODB.Stream");
    ndFile.dataType = "bin.base64";

    ado_stream.Type = 1; // 1=adTypeBinary
    ado_stream.Open();
    ado_stream.write( ndFile.nodeTypedValue );
    ado_stream.SaveToFile( strFileName, 2 );
    ado_stream.Close(); 
}

Upvotes: 2

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