Use Java to Parse XML for Specific Element

Question

I'm receiving the below xml response and I need to parse so that all I get is Collection of the URL128 xml Element values. Any ideas on the most efficient way to accomplish this in Java?

  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
    <imagesXML>
        <Images>
            <Image>
                <ImageUID Scope="Public" Type="Guid" Value="{7f2535d0-9a41-4997-9694-0a4de569e6d9}"/>
                <CorbisID Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="42-15534232"/>
                <Title Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="Animal"/>
                <CreditLine Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="¬© Robert Llewellyn/Corbis"/>
                <IsRoyaltyFree Scope="Public" Type="Boolean" Value="False"/><AspectRatio Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="1.500000"/>
                <URL128 Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="http://cachens.corbis.com/CorbisImage/thumb/15/53/42/15534232/42-15534232.jpg"/>
            </Image>
            <Image>
                <ImageUID Scope="Public" Type="Guid" Value="{7f2535d0-9a41-4997-9694-0a4de569e6d9}"/>
                <CorbisID Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="42-15534232"/>
                <Title Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="Animal"/>
                <CreditLine Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="¬© Robert Llewellyn/Corbis"/>
                <IsRoyaltyFree Scope="Public" Type="Boolean" Value="False"/><AspectRatio Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="1.500000"/>
                <URL128 Scope="Public" Type="String" Value="http://cachens.corbis.com/CorbisImage/thumb/15/53/42/15534232/42-15534232.jpg"/>
            </Image>
        </Images>
    </imagesXML>

if thats all the xml then SAX would okay but I always ask people to look at groovy xmlslurper — Shahzeb
– Shahzeb, Commented Aug 10, 2011 at 7:11
By 'efficient', do you mean fast, or do you mean least effort/code? If fast, I might recommend SAX or StAX parsing (or even custom parsing just to get at that one element). If least effort, then DOM parsing or even a 3rd-party lib that provides XPath evaluation. — Alistair A. Israel
– Alistair A. Israel, Commented Aug 10, 2011 at 7:13
least effort in coding without majorly sacrificing performance — c12
– c12, Commented Aug 10, 2011 at 8:22

prunge · Accepted Answer · 2011-08-10 07:33:59Z

4

The Java XPath API is simple to use:

String xmlData = "<test><one><URL128 myAttribute='value' /></one></test>";
InputSource source = new InputSource(new StringReader(xmlData)); //or use your own input source

XPath xPath = XPathFactory.newInstance().newXPath();

NodeList list = (NodeList)xPath.evaluate("//URL128", source, XPathConstants.NODESET);
List<Element> elements = new ArrayList<Element>(list.getLength());
for (int i = 0; i < list.getLength(); i++)
{
    elements.add((Element)list.item(i));
}

answered Aug 10, 2011 at 7:33

prunge

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1 Comment

c12 Over a year ago

great example prunge! are you using javax.xml.bind.Element in your example? I wasn't sure how to extract the date from the Collection of Element objects. I probably have the wrong import...

JB Nizet · Accepted Answer · 2011-08-10 07:13:33Z

2

Use SAX, and implement the startElement method so that if the element name is "URL128", you extract the three attributes Scope, Type and Value, store them in a custom object, and add this object to a List.

It will be both easy and fast.

answered Aug 10, 2011 at 7:13

JB Nizet

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