Read xml file with more than one value in one tag in Java

Question

I have xml file like this

  <Sample_Data>
    <lastname Name="lastname" Value="FIRSTNAME" />
    <firstname Name="firstname" Value="LASTNAME" />
    <DM Name="DM" Value="93.2" />
    <CP Name="CP" Value="7.7" />
  </Sample_Data>

I need to read this file with java and I use code like this:

 try {

    DocumentBuilderFactory dbFactory = DocumentBuilderFactory.newInstance();
    DocumentBuilder dBuilder = dbFactory.newDocumentBuilder();
    Document doc = dBuilder.parse("File.xml");

    doc.getDocumentElement().normalize();

    System.out.println("Root element :" + doc.getDocumentElement().getNodeName());

    NodeList nList = doc.getElementsByTagName("Sample_Data");

    System.out.println("----------------------------");

    for (int temp = 0; temp < nList.getLength(); temp++) {

        Node nNode = nList.item(temp);

        System.out.println("\nCurrent Element :" + nNode.getNodeName());

        if (nNode.getNodeType() == Node.ELEMENT_NODE) {

            Element eElement = (Element) nNode;


            System.out.println("First Name : " + eElement.getElementsByTagName("firstname").item(0).getTextContent());
            System.out.println("Last Name : " + eElement.getElementsByTagName("lastname").item(0).getTextContent());
            System.out.println("DM : " + eElement.getElementsByTagName("DM").item(0).getTextContent());
            System.out.println("CP : " + eElement.getElementsByTagName("CP").item(0).getTextContent());

        }
    }

    } catch (Exception e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
    }

But I can't get values of firstname, lastname, DM and CP I get empty values for them.

Can someone help me to resolve this problem?

vanje · Accepted Answer · 2017-08-02 14:53:03Z

2

All your elements doesn't have a text node. So getTextContent() is empty. You should read the attributes instead.

getElementsByTagName().item(0) returns a Node, so you should first cast it to Element.

((Element) eElement.getElementsByTagName("firstname").item(0)).getAttribute("Value")

In procuction code, you should also check, if the NodeList eElement.getElementsByTagName("firstname") contains some items.

edited Aug 2, 2017 at 14:53

answered Aug 2, 2017 at 14:46

vanje

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Comments

Alexandre Thyvador · Accepted Answer · 2017-08-02 14:53:58Z

0

I would say that the best thing to do is to get a proper XML file. That way you would not have to parse multiple attributes.

You got that :

<Sample_Data>
    <lastname Name="lastname" Value="FIRSTNAME" />
    <firstname Name="firstname" Value="LASTNAME" />
    <DM Name="DM" Value="93.2" />
    <CP Name="CP" Value="7.7" />
</Sample_Data>

Instead you should have something like that :

<Sample_Data>
    <lastname> FIRSTNAME </lastname>
    <firstname> firstname </firstname>
    <DM> 93.2 <DM/>
    <CP> 7.7 </CP>
</Sample_Data>

Wouldn't that be easier to work with ?

answered Aug 2, 2017 at 14:53

Alexandre Thyvador

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1 Comment

dzivi Over a year ago

Yes that would be easier but I get xml file like in my example. Thanks for your comment.

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