XML Parsing Using Java APIs

AIP Independence project

Fall 2010

XML overview

XML (eXtensible Markup Language) is a language specification created by the W3C

A very general version of HTML Format takes the form of arbitrary tags that

contain information e.g. <recordCreationDate encoding="w3cdtf">2010-10-06</recordCreationDate>

These tags are defined in XML schema documents (.xsd)

JAXP

Java API for XML Processing, the default Java XML library

There are two main default interfaces

SAX

SAX (Simple API for XML) is used for serial reading, analogous to a file stream Faster and uses less memory Doesn’t store the XML file in memory The user is responsible for keeping track of

needed data

DOM

DOM (Document-Object Model) Creates an actual internal tree representation of

the XML Provides non-sequential access, allowing data to

be manipulated at will Slower and takes more memory

A related API: JAXB

Java API for XML Binding A separate and somewhat more sophisticated

approach Using the schema document, XML tags are bound

as actual Java objects Allows intuitive coding, but also memory-intensive

A simple example

This program uses SAX to print the provided sample MODS document

Doesn’t apply any formatting or try to figure out how to use the information yet, but this should be possible using the MODS specification