XML Tutorial/fr

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Introduction

The Extensible Markup Language is a W3C recommended language created to interchange information between different systems. It is a text based way to store information. Modern data interchange languages such as XHTML, as well as most WebServices technologies, are based on XML.

Currently there is a set of units that provides support for XML on Free Pascal. These units are called "XMLRead", "XMLWrite" and "DOM" and they are part of the Free Component Library (FCL) from the Free Pascal Compiler. The FCL is already on the default search path for the compiler on Lazarus, so you only need to add the units to your uses clause in order to get XML support. The FCL is not documented currently (October / 2005), so this short tutorial aims at introducing XML access using those units.

The XML DOM (Document Object Model) is a set of standarized objects that provide a similar interface for the use of XML on different languages and systems. The standard only specifies the methods, properties and other interface parts of the object, leaving the implementation free for different languages. The FCL currently supports fully the XML DOM 1.0.

Basic Example

For Delphi Programmers: Note that when working with TXMLDocument, the text within a Node is considered a separate TEXT Node. As a result, you must access a node's text value as a separate node. For instance, consider the following XML:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<request>
  <request_type>PUT_FILE</request_type>
  <username>123</username>
  <password>abc</password>
</request>

Consider also the following code example:

var
 PassNode: TDOMNode;
 Doc:      TXMLDocument;
begin
 Doc := TXMLDocument.Create;
 // Read in xml file from disk
 ReadXMLFile(Doc, 'c:\xmlfiles\test.xml');
 // Retrieve the "password" node
 PassNode := Doc.DocumentElement.FindNode('password');
 // Write out value of the selected node
 WriteLn(PassNode.NodeValue); // will be blank
 // The text of the node is actually a separate child node
 WriteLn(PassNode.FirstChild.NodeValue); // correctly prints "abc"


Let´s say you want to access a XML file called 'C:\Programas\teste.xml'. Here is the file content:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<images directory="mydir">
 <imageNode URL="graphic.jpg" title="">
   <Peca DestinoX="0" DestinoY="0">Pecacastelo.jpg1.swf</Peca>
   <Peca DestinoX="0" DestinoY="86">Pecacastelo.jpg2.swf</Peca>
 </imageNode>
</images>

The following code can write the Node´s names to a TMemo placed on a form:

var
 Documento: TXMLDocument;
 i, j: Integer;
begin
 Documento := TXMLDocument.Create;
 ReadXMLFile(Documento, 'C:\Programas\teste.xml');
 Memo.Lines.Clear;
 with Documento.DocumentElement.ChildNodes do
 begin
   for i := 0 to (Count - 1) do
   begin
     Memo.Lines.Add(Item[i].NodeName + ' ' + Item[i].NodeValue);
     for j := 0 to (Item[i].ChildNodes.Count - 1) do
     begin
       Memo.Lines.Add(Item[i].ChildNodes.Item[j].NodeName + ' '
        + Item[i].ChildNodes.Item[j].NodeValue);
     end;
   end;
 end;
 Documento.Free;
end;

Populating a TreeView with XML

One common use of XML files is to parse them and show their contents in a tree like format. You can find the TTreeView component on the "Common Controls" tab on Lazarus.

The function below will take a XML document previously loaded from a file or generated on code, and will populate a TreeView with it´s contents. The caption of each node will be the content of the first attribute of each node.

procedure TForm1.XML2Tree(tree: TTreeView; XMLDoc: TXMLDocument);
var
  iNode: TDOMNode;

  procedure ProcessNode(Node: TDOMNode; TreeNode: TTreeNode);
  var
    cNode: TDOMNode;
  begin
    if Node = nil then Exit; // Stops if reached a leaf
    
    // Adds a node to the tree
    TreeNode := tree.Items.AddChild(TreeNode, Node.Attributes[0].NodeValue);

    // Goes to the child node
    cNode := Node.ChildNodes.Item[0];

    // Processes all child nodes
    while cNode <> nil do
    begin
      ProcessNoDe(cNode, TreeNode);
      cNode := cNode.NextSibling;
    end;
  end;
    
begin
  iNode := XMLDoc.DocumentElement.ChildNodes.Item[0];
  while iNode <> nil do
  begin
    ProcessNode(iNode, nil); // Recursive
    iNode := iNode.NextSibling;
  end;
end;

Modifying a XML document

The first thing to remember is that TDOMDocument is the "handle" to the DOM. You can get an instance of this class by creating one or by loading a XML document.

Nodes on the other hand cannot be created like a normal object. You *must* use the methods provided by TDOMDocument to create them, and latter use other methods to put them on the correct place on the tree. This is because nodes must be "owned" by a specific document on DOM.

Below are some common methods from TDOMDocument:

   function CreateElement(const tagName: DOMString): TDOMElement; virtual;
   function CreateTextNode(const data: DOMString): TDOMText;
   function CreateCDATASection(const data: DOMString): TDOMCDATASection;
     virtual;
   function CreateAttribute(const name: DOMString): TDOMAttr; virtual;

And here an example method that will located the selected item on a TTreeView and then insert a child node to the XML document it represents. The TreeView must be previously filled with the contents of a XML file using the XML2Tree function.

procedure TForm1.actAddChildNode(Sender: TObject);
var
  Posicao: Integer;
  NovoNo: TDomNode;
begin
  {*******************************************************************
  *  Detects the selected element
  *******************************************************************}
  if TreeView1.Selected = nil then Exit;

  if TreeView1.Selected.Level = 0 then
  begin
    Posicao := TreeView1.Selected.Index;

    NovoNo := XMLDoc.CreateElement('item');
    TDOMElement(NovoNo).SetAttribute('nome', 'Item');
    TDOMElement(NovoNo).SetAttribute('arquivo', 'Arquivo');
    XMLDoc.DocumentElement.ChildNodes.Item[Posicao].AppendChild(NovoNo);

    {*******************************************************************
    *  Updates the TreeView
    *******************************************************************}
    TreeView1.Items.Clear;
    XML2Tree(TreeView1, XMLDoc);
  end
  else if TreeView1.Selected.Level >= 1 then
  begin
    {*******************************************************************
    *  This function only works on the first level of the tree,
    *  but can easely modifyed to work for any number of levels
    *******************************************************************}
  end;
end;


Create a TXMLDocument from a string

Given al XML file in MyXmlString, the following code will create it's DOM:

Var
  S : TStringStream;
  XML : TXMLDocument;

begin
  S:= TStringStream.Create(MyXMLString);
  Try
    S.Position:=0;
    XML:=Nil;
    ReadXMLFile(XML,S); // Complete XML document
    // Alternatively:
    ReadXMLFragment(AParentNode,S); // Read only XML fragment.
  Finally
    S.Free;
  end;
end;