Java - Keep whitespaces after saving XML

Question

I have XML files where i have to remove just 1 attribute.

After saving the edited XML the whitespaces are deleted, which i need! (see image)

When do i lose the whitespaces?

When i parse the xml in a doc? Or when i transform back to an xml?

I already use much Output Propertys from the Java Transformer like:

    transformer.setOutputProperty(OutputKeys.ENCODING, encoding);
    transformer.setOutputProperty(OutputKeys.INDENT, "yes");
    transformer.setOutputProperty("{http://xml.apache.org/xslt}indent-amount", "2");
    transformer.setOutputProperty(OutputKeys.DOCTYPE_PUBLIC, "yes");
    transformer.setOutputProperty(OutputKeys.CDATA_SECTION_ELEMENTS, "RequestMessage Code");

to avoid other formating problems.

Is there a way to keep the whitespace?

Thank you

EDIT 1: XSL I use to avoid an alphabetical order

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" xmlns:xalan="http://xml.apache.org/xslt" version="2.0">
    <xsl:output method="xml" encoding="UTF-8" indent="yes" xalan:indent-amount="2"/>

    <!--Identity transformation (see http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt#copying).-->
    <xsl:template match="@*|node()">
        <xsl:copy>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Item"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Name"/>            
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Include"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Variant"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Authorization"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Alias"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Source"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Field"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@DgMemberName"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@DgGroupName"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Target"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@Host"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@DataGroup"/>
            <xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()"/>
        </xsl:copy>
    </xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>

Here u see the Diff between the two XML files

Why do you need bunch of spaces between attributes ? I doubt that the transformer has any option for such a strange thing . — Arnaud
– Arnaud, Commented Jun 14, 2016 at 9:03
XML is there to store data, not to present data. If you need a cute presentation, consider throwing an XSL transformation in . — Arnaud
– Arnaud, Commented Jun 14, 2016 at 9:13
There are no XML parsers/generators what will retain spaces between attributes. Only way for that to happen, is for you to read and update the XML text yourself. Highly discouraged. — Andreas
– Andreas, Commented Jun 14, 2016 at 9:25

Michael Kay · Accepted Answer · 2016-06-14 09:32:28Z

1

I think the answer to your question is that it can't be done using any readily-available XML serializer.

I sympathise with the requirement because I've got XML files formatted like that too. But I think it's a sufficiently rare use case that if you want to tackle it, you'll need to write your own serializer.

answered Jun 14, 2016 at 9:32

Michael Kay

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