XSD Element Not Null or Empty Constraint For Xml?

Question

This is my sample XML Code:

<bestContact>
<firstName><![CDATA[12345]]></firstName>
<lastName />
</bestContact>

I am using:

<xs:element name="lastName" type="xs:string" minOccurs="1" nillable="false"/>

The XSD Should be validate lastName as not null or empty.

CodeMonkey1313 · Accepted Answer · 2016-11-15 19:05:20Z

61

Try

<xs:element name="lastName" minOccurs="1" nillable="false">
  <xs:simpleType>
     <xs:restriction base="xs:string">
       <xs:minLength value="1"/>
     </xs:restriction>
  </xs:simpleType>
</xs:element>

edited Nov 15, 2016 at 19:05

CodeMonkey1313

16.1k19 gold badges79 silver badges110 bronze badges

answered Dec 10, 2010 at 12:20

Kamal

2,5222 gold badges35 silver badges48 bronze badges

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

1 Comment

Pablo Pazos Over a year ago

Using this I get "Element 'lastName' has both a 'type' attribute and a 'anonymous type' child. Only one of these is allowed for an element." I think there is a problem on using type="xs:string" in the container element.

C. M. Sperberg-McQueen · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-10 22:57:14Z

22

<xsd:element name="lastName" type="NonEmptyString" nillable="false"/>

<xsd:simpleType name="NonEmptyString">
  <xsd:restriction base="xs:string">
    <xsd:minLength value="1" />
    <xsd:pattern value=".*[^\s].*" />
  </xsd:restriction>
</xsd:simpleType>

edited Oct 10, 2012 at 22:57

C. M. Sperberg-McQueen

25.2k6 gold badges42 silver badges65 bronze badges

answered Oct 10, 2012 at 22:31

sri

2212 silver badges2 bronze badges

2 Comments

ycomp Over a year ago

I like this better than the 2 offered by Gab, this one works for me.Since I was looking for an expression that just got rid of the leading spaces, not the spaces in between text

bvdb Over a year ago

I think you can just replace this regex by \S+ as Gab pointed out.

Koopakiller · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-05 08:28:15Z

11

This is IMHO a better pattern:

<xs:simpleType name="NonEmptyString">
   <xs:restriction base="xs:string">
      <xs:pattern value="^(?!\s*$).+" />
   </xs:restriction>
</xs:simpleType>

or

<xs:simpleType name="NonEmptyStringWithoutSpace">
   <xs:restriction base="xs:string">
      <xs:pattern value="\S+"/>
   </xs:restriction>
</xs:simpleType>

edited Aug 5, 2015 at 8:28

Koopakiller

2,8813 gold badges34 silver badges50 bronze badges

answered Jul 23, 2013 at 9:44

Gab

8,3504 gold badges43 silver badges73 bronze badges

4 Comments

ycomp Over a year ago

is there any advantage to your first proposal over the second one?

Gab Over a year ago

Well a (non empty) blanck string will be allowed by the 1st one but not the 2nd. It just depends on your needs

Tiago Medici Over a year ago

how can i have a <xs:attribute name="" type="MDFS" use="optional" /> optional, pattern <xs:simpleType name="MDFS"> <xs:restriction base="xs:string"> <xs:pattern value="[A-Za-z]\d{3}" /> </xs:restriction> </xs:simpleType>, since it is optional, having a type, it can not be null !!!! is it possible being null having a type pattern ?

Dwij Sheth Over a year ago

(? will lead to an invalid xsd so the 1st solution will not work

Nic Gibson · Accepted Answer · 2010-12-10 12:24:05Z

9

@Kamal has given you basically right answer here. This is why - nillable always seems to cause problems. Effectively, you can consider nillable as meaning allow the xsi:nil attribute on this element. The XML Schema spec describes nillable as an out of band signal - it's basically used to indicate NULL to databases.

What you want is an element that must be at least one character long as given by @Kamal

answered Dec 10, 2010 at 12:24

Nic Gibson

7,1634 gold badges33 silver badges40 bronze badges

Comments

pcfist · Accepted Answer · 2019-07-09 20:54:31Z

0

This was my favourite solution.

<xs:simpleType name="NonEmptyString">
    <xs:restriction base="xs:string">
        <xs:pattern value="[\s\S]*[^ ][\s\S]*"/>
    </xs:restriction>
</xs:simpleType>

edited Jul 9, 2019 at 20:54

pcfist

1931 gold badge3 silver badges9 bronze badges

answered Aug 23, 2016 at 7:46

mrx

1

Comments

codesniffer · Accepted Answer · 2024-06-24 17:05:47Z

0

My 2 solutions:

Use xs:token so leading & trailing spaces are ignored and a minimum length of 1:

  <xs:simpleType name="NonEmptyElementType">
    <xs:restriction base="xs:token">
      <xs:minLength value="1"/>
    </xs:restriction>
  </xs:simpleType>

Use xs:string so leading & trailing spaces are permitted, and a simple regex to verify at least one non-whitespace character is present (in this solution the <xs:minLength value="1"/> is not necessary, but I like the readability of it for future maintainers.):

  <xs:simpleType name="NonEmptyElementType">
    <xs:restriction base="xs:string">
      <xs:minLength value="1"/>
      <xs:pattern value=".*\S.*"/>
    </xs:restriction>
  </xs:simpleType>

edited Jun 24, 2024 at 17:05

answered Jun 17, 2024 at 21:31

codesniffer

1,22613 silver badges23 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

XSD Element Not Null or Empty Constraint For Xml?

6 Answers 6

1 Comment

2 Comments

4 Comments

Comments

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

6 Answers 6

1 Comment

2 Comments

4 Comments

Comments

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Linked

Related