Removing whitespace in SAX Parser

Question

I have the following XML file.Why whitespaces are coming in characters() even after applying validation

<Employee>
<Name>
James
</Name>
<Id>
11
</Id>
</Employee>

I am trying to display text in between the tags.

 public class MyHandler extends DefaultHandler {

    boolean isName = false;
    boolean isId = false;

    @Override
    public void characters(char[] arg0, int arg1, int arg2) throws SAXException {
        if (isName) {
            System.out.println(new String(arg0, arg1, arg2));
            isName = false;
        }
        if (isId) {
            System.out.println(new String(arg0, arg1, arg2));
            isId = false;
        }
    }

    @Override
    public void startElement(String arg0, String arg1, String arg2,
            Attributes arg3) throws SAXException {          
        if (arg2.equalsIgnoreCase("Name")) {
            isName = true;
        }
        if (arg2.equalsIgnoreCase("Id")) {
            isId = true;
        }
    }

}

Desired Ouput:

James
11

Actual Output:

James

11

Why spaces ares coming in output?

Jim Garrison · Accepted Answer · 2013-10-06 07:58:09Z

2

The actual string value of the text node that is a child of the <Name> tag is

\nJames\n

Likewise, the string value of the text node in the <Id> is

\n11\n

where \n represents a newline character. None of the newlines are ignorable whitespace. If you want to remove them you must do it yourself, in your Java code.

answered Oct 6, 2013 at 7:58

Jim Garrison

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Comments

Michael Kay · Accepted Answer · 2013-10-06 08:02:29Z

2

You could have the whitespace removed for you if you put the XML through a schema (XSD) validator and declare the types of Name and Id with a type that collapses all whitespace, e.g. type xs:token. A DTD validator will never do this for text nodes (only for attribute nodes).

answered Oct 6, 2013 at 8:02

Michael Kay

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Comments

user207421 · Accepted Answer · 2015-07-21 08:06:39Z

0

If you use a validating parser it will report the ignorable whitespace via ignorableWhitespace() method instead of characters().

Otherwise the parser is perfectly entitled to give you whitespace via characters(). See the Javadoc.

edited Jul 21, 2015 at 8:06

answered Oct 6, 2013 at 6:35

user207421

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2 Comments

Sanjana Over a year ago

It will not give me text in between the tags.

user207421 Over a year ago

@Sanjana I do not understand your comment. Please explain.

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