XML Escape Characters in Java

Question

I have an object which I write to an xml. The xml has escape characters like "&", "<" etc. Now before I process this xml I want a utility to escape these special characters so that the resultant xml has & followed by "amp;" for "&" and "&" followed by "lt;" for "<". I tried StringUtils, XMLWriter and few more but they convert the "<" in opening and closing tags as well which I dont want. I only want "<" in the attribute values to be replaced. Please help. Example;

I have the input xml as this

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<personName><firstName>Sam & Pat </firstName>
<sal> > than 10000 </sal>
</personName>

And the expected xml should be `

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<personName><firstName>Sam &amp; Pat </firstName>
<sal> &lt; than 10000 </sal>
</personName>

If I am using StringUtils, it converts all the "<" characters like this

&lt;sal&gt; &lt; than 10000 &lt;/sal&gt;

EDIT: I can't actually use JaxB. I am using FreeMarkerTemplate to do this. Here is the code .

File tempFile = File.createTempFile(fileName, ".tmp");
try (FileWriter writer = new FileWriter(tempFile)) {
freeMarkerConfig.setOutputEncoding(UTF_8);
    Template template = freeMarkerConfig.getTemplate(templateName);
    template.process(data, writer);
}              `                                                                                                    
The resultant file which get created should have the handled escape characters.

Add a concrete example of what you want to achieve. Input and Output. Please read stackoverflow.com/help/how-to-ask — reto
– reto, Commented Aug 5, 2015 at 6:01
IMO After reading through this thread I believe your source should be responsible for sending a valid XML file. You can encode, escape the data as you wish, but a valid XML structure should not be your concern. — Andrew
– Andrew, Commented Feb 8, 2021 at 7:39

Flagman · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-06 10:26:43Z

4

You can also use Apache Commons Lang Library for escaping the characters:

Example:

    String escapeString1 = "Sam & Pat ";
    System.out.println("Escaped : " + StringEscapeUtils.escapeXml11(escapeString1));

    String escapeString2 = " > than 10000";
    System.out.println("Escaped : " + StringEscapeUtils.escapeXml11(escapeString2));

Output:

Escaped : Sam &amp; Pat 
Escaped :  &gt; than 10000

answered Aug 6, 2015 at 10:26

Flagman

4567 silver badges24 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

1 Comment

user2111569 Over a year ago

StringEscapeUtils is fine to use if its just a string. But using this api for xml string converts every occurrence of '<' and '>' which makes it a malformed xml. Example :- <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <personName> <firstName>Sam & Pat </firstName> </personName> <sal> < than 10000 </sal>

Flagman · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-05 08:19:50Z

0

You can use JAXB for the XML generation. Annotate your Model-Class with @XmlRootElement

Then you can use JAXB for marshalling the XML-Object:

try {
  JAXBContext context = JAXBContext.newInstance(Person.class);

  Marshaller m = context.createMarshaller();
  m.setProperty(Marshaller.JAXB_FORMATTED_OUTPUT, true);

  Person object = new Person();
  object.setPersonName("Sam & Pat");
  object.setSal("> than 10000");

  m.marshal(object, System.out);
} catch (JAXBException e) {
  e.printStackTrace();
}

The output will be

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<person>
    <personName>Sam &amp; Pat</personName>
    <sal>&gt; than 10000</sal>
</person>

edited Aug 5, 2015 at 8:19

answered Aug 5, 2015 at 8:12

Flagman

4567 silver badges24 bronze badges

1 Comment

user2111569 Over a year ago

I cant use JaxB as we have to use FreeMarkerTemplate to generate the xml file based on a *.ftl template. I have added the code above for that. I cant find any any way to achieve with freemarker.

Arulkumar · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-06 06:42:14Z

0

Using CDATA will fix your problem.

Such as <![CDATA[abc]]>

edited Aug 6, 2015 at 6:42

Arulkumar

13.3k15 gold badges51 silver badges76 bronze badges

answered Aug 6, 2015 at 5:25

coolcloud

471 silver badge4 bronze badges

1 Comment

user2111569 Over a year ago

I am not sure how to use CDATA as we get XML from the client and we cannot change it. Can you please elaborate this?

Roger F. Gay · Accepted Answer · 2015-11-10 16:47:10Z

0

You can include XML special characters in XPL. XPL has exactly the same structure as XML, but allows the special characters in text fields. http://hll.nu/

answered Nov 10, 2015 at 16:47

Roger F. Gay

2,0012 gold badges21 silver badges25 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

XML Escape Characters in Java

4 Answers 4

1 Comment

1 Comment

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

4 Answers 4

1 Comment

1 Comment

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related