[library] libxml

[rdlaitila]

Hello All,

I would like to present my newly released library libxml. The code was ripped from, and slightly re-factored for more strict XML use from my other ongoing project LURE. The library is the first incarnation to allow lovers to load, save, and traverse XML documents using standard XML DOM interfaces. Let me show you some examples:

XML Document:

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<players>
	<player name="Player1">
		<location xPos="100" yPos="200"/>
		<item type="weapon" class="rifle" />
		<item type="ammo" class="rifle" />
		<item type="healthpack" />
		<item type="healthpack" />
		<item type="healthpack" />
	</player>
	<player name="Player2">
		<location xPos="500" yPos="200"/>
		<item type="weapon" class="pistol" />
		<item type="ammo" class="pistol" />
		<item type="healthpack" />		
	</player>
</players>

Loading the players.xml document:

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function love.load()
	require "libxml//libxml"
	
	xmldoc = libxml.load("player.xml")	
end

You can now traverse the xml document much like you would expect from languages such as javascript etc:

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function love.load()
	require "libxml//libxml"
	
	xmldoc = libxml.load("player.xml")	
	print(xmldoc.documentElement.childNodes[1].getAttribute("name"))
        --OUTPUT: Player1
end

You can even create new elements and insert them into the document:

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function love.load()
	require "libxml//libxml"
	
	xmldoc = libxml.load("player.xml")	
	newPlayer = xmldoc.createElement("player")
	newPlayer.setAttribute("name", "player3")
	
	newItem = xmldoc.createElement("item")
	newItem.setAttribute("type", "healthpack")
	
	newPlayer.appendChild(newItem)	
	xmldoc.documentElement.appendChild(newPlayer)	
end

And to save your newly modified document to file, simply call the libxml.save() function:

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function love.load()
	require "libxml//libxml"
	
	xmldoc = libxml.load("player.xml")
	
	newPlayer = xmldoc.createElement("player")
	newPlayer.setAttribute("name", "player3")
	
	newItem = xmldoc.createElement("item")
	newItem.setAttribute("type", "healthpack")
	newItem.isSelfClosing = true
	
	newPlayer.appendChild(newItem)	
	xmldoc.documentElement.appendChild(newPlayer)
	
	libxml.save(xmldoc, "player-new.xml")
end

The above would generate the following new xml in player-new.xml in your user directory:

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<players>
	<player name="Player1">
		<location xPos="100" yPos="200" />
		<item type="weapon" class="rifle" />
		<item type="ammo" class="rifle" />
		<item type="healthpack" />
		<item type="healthpack" />
		<item type="healthpack" />
	</player>
	<player name="Player2">
		<location xPos="500" yPos="200" />
		<item type="weapon" class="pistol" />
		<item type="ammo" class="pistol" />
		<item type="healthpack" />
	</player>
	<player name="player3">
		<item type="healthpack" />
	</player>
</players>

Lastly for now, the library also does dynamic node name traversal (XPath equivalent not implemented):

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function love.load()
	require "libxml//libxml"
	
	xmldoc = libxml.load("player.xml")	
	print( xmldoc.players.player[2].getAttribute("name") )
	--OUTPUT: Player 2
	print( xmldoc.players.player[2].location.getAttribute("xPos") )
	--OUTPUT: 500
	print( xmldoc.players.player[2].item[2].getAttribute("type") )
	--OUTPUT: healthpack
end

KNOWN LIMITATIONS

• - Does not understand XML Namespaces
  - Does not parse document <? xml ?> tags yet
  - Does not parse document processing instructions
  - Does not have XPath capabilities yet
  - The parser is non-validating, so you must ensure your xml structure is proper
  - Everything including node tagNames are case-sensative
  - Does not expand entity references

Let me know what you guys think. While its an ealy release, if you guys find any show-stopper bugs or would like a feature implimented please visit the gitup issues page to submit bugs/feature requests. https://github.com/admin36/libxml/issues

[Llamageddon]

This looks really awesome, but without a license, it's unusable, you really should add one. If you're not sure, and want it to be open source, just go with MIT, find a copy, and put it in the github repo.