Expat (XML Parser Toolkit) Module for Ruby
              version 0.7.2

              Yoshida Masato
         <[email protected]>
  • Introduction

This is a module to access to James Clark’s XML Parser Toolkit “expat” (www.jclark.com/xml/expat.html) from Ruby.

Supported versions of expat are 1.95.0 or later (sourceforge.net/projects/expat/).

  • Installation

This can work with ruby-1.6. I recommend you to use ruby-1.6.7 or later. And you need the source code of expat-1.95.x.

First, compile expat. With expat-1.95.x, configure; make; make install.

Then, compile xmlparser. You can specify the location of expat’s header file or library file.

--with-expat-dir=/path/to/expat

or

--with-expat-lib=/path/to/expat/lib
--with-expat-include=/path/to/expat/inclide

If you want to use encoding maps of XML::Parser of Perl, set the proper directory with –with-perl-enc-map option.

For example:

ruby extconf.rb --with-expat-dir=/usr/local --with-perl-enc-map=/usr/local/share/XML/Parser/Encodings
make
make site-install
  • Usage

If you do not link this module with Ruby statically,

require "xml/parser"

before using.

There is two styles to get parsing result. One is to define instance methods as event handlers, another is to use iterator.

To define event handlers is like SAX (Simple API for XML).

If you use event handlers, inherit XMLParser class and define instance methods as event handlers. Or you may use the instance of XMLParser class (or derived) with singleton instance methods as event handlers.

When no event handlers are defined, this parser does non-validating syntax checking only.

method name              | event
-------------------------+---------------------------
startElement             | element start tag
endElement               | element end tag
character                | character data
processingInstruction    | processing instruction
unparsedEntityDecl       | unparsed entity declaration(OBSOLETE)
notationDecl             | notation declaration
externalEntityRef        | external entity reference
comment                  | comment
startCdata               | CDATA section start
endCdata                 | CDATA section end
startNamespaceDecl       | Namespace declaration start
endNamespaceDecl         | Namespace declaration end
startDoctypeDecl         | DOCTYPE declaration start
endDoctypeDecl           | DOCTYPE declaration end
notStandalone            | document is not standalone
default                  | other data
defaultExpand            | same as default (*1)
unknownEncoding          | unknown character encoding
elementDecl              | element declaration
attlistDecl              | attlist declaration
xmlDecl                  | XML declaration
entityDecl               | entity declaration

*1 inhibits expansion of internal entities. defaultExpand
   have higher priority than default.

To use iterator is probably a ruby-ish manner.

If you use iterator, this parser ignores event handlers even if they are defined. The iterator evaluates the iterator block with three variables, event type, name, and data.

event type                        | name            | data
----------------------------------+-----------------+-------------------
START_ELEM                        | element name    | hash of attributes
END_ELEM                          | element name    | nil
CDATA                             | nil             | string
PI                                | PI name         | string
UNPARSED_ENTITY_DECL(OBSOLETE)    | entity name     | array (*1)
NOTATION_DECL                     | notation name   | array (*2)
EXTERNAL_ENTITY_REF               | entity names(*5)| array (*2)
COMMENT                           | nil             | string
START_CDATA                       | nil             | nil
END_CDATA                         | nil             | nil
START_NAMESPACE_DECL              | prefix          | URI
END_NAMESPACE_DECL                | prefix          | nil
START_DOCTYPE_DECL                | doctype name    | nil
END_DOCTYPE_DECL                  | nil             | nil
DEFAULT (*4)                      | nil             | string
ELEMENT_DECL                      | element name    | array (*8)
ATTLIST_DECL                      | element name    | array (*9)
XML_DECL                          | nil             | array (*10)
ENTITY_DECL                       | entity name     | array (*11)

*1 [URL base, system ID, public ID, notation name]
    URL base and notation name may be nil.
*2 [URL base, system ID, public ID]
    URL base, system ID and public ID may be nil.
*4 defaultExpand enables this event
*5 It may be nil
*8 [type, quant, name, [...]]
*9 [attname, atttype, default, isrequired]
*10 [version, encoding, standalone]
*11 [isPE, value, system ID, public ID, notation name]

UNPARSED_ENTITY_DECL, NOTATION_DECL, EXTERNAL_ENTITY_REF, COMMENT, START_CDATA, END_CDATA, START_NAMESPACE_DECL, END_NAMESPACE_DECL, DEFAULT, ELEMENT_DECL, ATTLIST_DECL, XML_DECL and ENTITY_DECL events are generated only if each dummy methods, “unparsedEntityDecl”, “notationDecl”, “externalEntityRef”, “comment”, “startCdata”, “endCdata”, “startNamespaceDecl”, “endNamespaceDecl”, “default” (or “defaultExpand”), “elementDecl”, “attlistDecl”, “xmlDecl” and “entityDecl” are defined.

Supported input character encodings are UTF-8 and UTF-16. Output character encoding is UTF-8. If XML_ENC_PATH is set on compiling, you can use the encoding maps of XML::Parser of Perl. This package not include them, you must get XML::Parser or XML::Encoding from CPAN, and install .enc files into the proper directory.

XMLParser class:

Class method
   new(encoding = nil, nssep = nil)
     Create a XML parser object. A failure of the
     creation raises a XMLParserError exception.

     The "encoding" parameter can specify the character
     encoding. Expat can recognize ISO-8859-1, UTF-8,
     US-ASCII and UTF-16, and expat_ja can also EUC-JP and
     Shift_JIS.

     The "nssep" parameter enables namespace extension.
     The namespace-prefixed element and attribute names are
     concatenated with the namespace's URI and a separator
     (the first byte of nssep).

     For example, with nssep = '!',

        <hoge:test xmlns:hoge="http://www.yoshidam.net/ns/hoge">

     is parsed into

        http://www.yoshidam.net/ns/hoge!test

     The object that finish parsing cannot be reused,
     so you must create a new one for every parsing.

   new(parser, context, encoding = nil)
     Create a XML parser object that can parse an external
     general entity. A failure of the creation raises a
     XMLParserError exception.

     This can be called at any point after the first call
     to an externalEntityRef event.

     The "context" parameter can be passed from the parse
     context of externalEntityRef event.

     The "encoding" parameter can specify the character
     encoding.

     Call "reset" to be reused.

   expatVersion()
     Get expat version.

   getFeatureList
     Get a hash list of expat API's features.

     This method is for expat-1.95.5 or later.

Method
   parse(str, isFinal = true)
     Parse a string. This method can be an
     iterator. Parsing results can be processed by event
     handlers or an iterator block.

     "IsFinal" parameter must true on last call of this
     method. Default is true. No parameter call of this
     method indicates the end of parsing.

     "Str" can be a stream object. It must be an object
     with "gets" method. In this case, "isFinal" is
     ignored, the parsing is repeated until the stream
     returns nil.

     A failure to parse raises a XMLParserError
     exception.

   done
     Free the parser. Usually you can trust the GC, but
     after parsing the external parameser entity, you must
     free the parser in the externalEntityRef event.

   defaultCurrent
     Raise a "default" event within any event handlers or
     an iterator block.
     You can get the corresponding markup.

     If within a event handler, it raise a default event
     immediately. But within an iterator block, the next
     yielding will be a DEFAULT event.

   setBase
     Set URL base. The setting value can get the parameter
     'base' of the external entity methods, such as
     unparsedEntityDecl.

   line
   column
   byteIndex
     Get current parsing location.

     When a "parse" method raises XML::Parser::Error, these
     method return the position of the error detected.

   byteCount
     Get the number of bytes in the current event.

     When the event is is in an internal entity, this
     method returns 0.

   getSpecifiedAttributes
     Check the attributes whether specified or defaulted.

     Return value is a hash, the keys are the attribute's
     name, the values are specified or not (boolean).

     This method should be used in startElement event
     handler.

   setParamEntityParsing(parsing)
     Controls parsing of parameter entities (including the
     external DTD subset ).

     "Parsing" parameter is
        PARAM_ENTITY_PARSING_NEVER (0) or
        PARAM_ENTITY_PARSING_UNLESS_STANDALONE (1) or
        PARAM_ENTITY_PARSING_ALWAYS (2).

     References to external parameter entities will invoke
     the externalEntityRef event. The context will be nil.

   setReturnNSTriplet(do_nst)
     Sets namespace triplet flag.

     It will work well for element names with Expat-1.95.3 or later 

   getInputContext
     Returns the parser's input buffer and current parse
     posion.

   getIdAttribute
     Gets the ID attribute name.

     This method should be used in startElement event
     handler.

   reset(encoding)
     Resets the parser object to be reused.

     The "encoding" parameter can specify the character
     encoding.

     This method is for the expat-1.95.3 or later.

   useForeignDTD(useDTD)
     Specifies to parse an external DTD subset without the
     DOCTYPE declaration.

     In externalEntityRef, sysID and pubID will be NULL.

     This method is for the expat-1.95.5 or later.

     See setParamEntityParsing also.

Method (event handler)
   startElement(name, attrs)
     This method is called when element start tags are
     detected.
     "Name" is the element name, attrs is a hash of
     attributes, the keys are the attribute's name, the
     values are attribute's values.

   endElement(name)
     This method is called when element end tags are
     detected.
     "Name" is the element name.

   character(data)
     This method is called when texts or CDATA sections are
     detected.
     Internal entities are expanded as long as "default"
     handler is not defined.

   processingInstruction(target, data)
     This method is called when processing instructions are
     detected.

   unparsedEntityDecl(entityName, base, systemId, publicId, notationName)
     ** OBSOLETE **
     This methods is called when parsed entity declarations
     are detected.
     "EntityName", "base", "systemId", "publicId" and
     "notationName" are the entity name, the URL base, the
     system identifier, the public identifier and the
     notation name.
     The URL base and the notation name can be nil.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause UNPARSED_ENTITY_DECL
     event.

   notationDecl(notationName, base, systemId, publicId)
     This methods is called when notation declarations are
     detected.
     "NotationName", "base", "systemId", and "publicId" are
     the notation name, the URL base, the system identifier
     and the public identifier.
     The URL base, the system identifier and the public
     identifier can be nil.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause NOTATION_DECL event.

   externalEntityRef(context, base, systemId, publicId)
     This methods is called when external entity references
     are detected.
     "context", "base", "systemId", and "publicId" are the
     parsing context, the URL base, the system identifier
     and the public identifier.
     The URL base and the public identifier can be nil.
     The context can use the 'context' parameter of the
     constructor of the external entity parser.

     If you do not parse the external entities by this
     event, the external entities are never parsed.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause EXTERNAL_ENTITY_REF
     event.

     On expat-19990626 or later, it is called when external
     parameter entity refs (including external DTD subset) are
     detected. In this case, "context" will be nil. The
     parser for the external parameter entitiy must be
     created, "parse" and "done" in this event.
     See setParamEntityParsing also.

   comment(data)
     This methods is called when comments are detected.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause COMMENT event.

   startCdata()
     This methods is called when CDATA sections start.
     The contents of the CDATA sections are reported by
     character event.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause START_CDATA event.

   endCdata()
     This methods is called when CDATA sections end.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause END_CDATA event.

   startNamespaceDecl(prefix, uri)
     This methods is called before the element that has
     namespace declaration.

     Prefix and uri can be nil.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause START_NAMESPACE_DECL
     event.

   endNamespaceDecl(prefix)
     This methods is called after the element that has
     namespace declaration.

     Prefix can be nil.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause END_NAMESPACE_DECL event.

   startDoctypeDecl(doctypeName, sysid, pubid, has_internal_subset)
     This methods is called when the name of the DOCTYPE is
     encountered.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause START_DOCTYPE_DECL event.

   endDoctypeDecl()
     This methods is called when the closing > is
     encountered, but after processing any external subset.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause END_DOCTYPE_DECL event.

   default(data)
     This method is called when there is no applicable
     event handler.

     If this method is defined, expansion of internal
     entities are inhibited.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause DEFAULT event and to
     inhibit expansion of internal entities.

   defaultExpand(data)
     This method is called when there is no applicable
     event handler.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause DEFAULT event.

     This method have higher priority than default method.

   unknownEncoding(name)
     This method is called when unknown encoding is
     detected.

     XMLEncoding object (or nil to reject) must be returned.

     Even if parse method is used as the iterator, this
     method is called.

   notStandalone()
     This methods is called if the document is not standalone
     (it has an external subset or a reference to a
      parameter entity, but does not have standalone="yes").

     If you may return 0 to raise an error, or return 1 to
     continue the parsing.

     Even if parse method is used as the iterator, this
     method is called.

   elementDecl(name, model)

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause ELEMENT_DECL event.

   attlistDecl(elname, attname, att_type, dflt, isrequired)

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause ATTLIST_DECL event.

   xmlDecl(version, encoding, standalone)

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause XML_DECL event.

   entityDecl(entityName, isparameter_entity, vale,
              base, systemId, publicId, notationName)

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause ENTITY_DECL event.

   skippedEntity(entityName, is_parameter_entity)

     This method is for expat-1.95.4.

     If you use iterator, this method is not called, but to
     define this affects to cause
     SKIPPED_ENTITY event.

XMLEncoding class:

To convert the character encoding, you must define map and
convert method.

Method
  map(code)
    This method is called to define byte stream
    information. Code is the first byte of stream, 00h to
    ffh. You must return the following value.

      >= 0     : treat as Unicode value
      -1       : the byte sequence is malformed
      -n (n>=2): n-byte sequence

  convert(s)
    This method is called to convert the byte sequence
    into a Unicode.
    The byte sequence is n-byte string (n is defined by
    map), you must return an integer value (treat as
    Unicode code point [<=65535]), an ASCII  character or two byte string
    (treat as a little endian UCS-2 character).

Exapmle:
  class EUCHandler<XML::Encoding
    def map(i)
      return i if i < 128
      return -1 if i < 160 or i == 255
      return -2 
    end
    def convert(s)
      s.force_encoding(Encoding::EUCJP).encode(Encoding::UTF_16LE)
    end
  end

  class SJISHandler<XML::Encoding
    def map(i)
      return i if i < 128
      return -2 
    end
    def convert(s)
      s.force_encoding(Encoding::CP932).encode(Encoding::UTF_16LE)
    end
  end

  def unknownEncoding(name)
    return EUCHandler.new if name =~ /^euc-jp$/i
    return SJISHandler.new if name =~ /^shift_jis$/i
    nil
  end
  • Additional Library

XML::DOM module and XML::DOM::Builder module are added since version 0.3.1. These module are not well documented, and API specification is not fixed, so they are for experts only.

XML::DOM module (xml/dom/core.rb)

This module is a library for making and manipulating XML
trees.
The APIs are like Document Object Model (DOM) Core of W3C.

Classes
  NameNodeMap
  NodeList
  Node
  DocumentFragment<Node
  Document<Node
  CharacterData<Node
  Attr<Node
  Element<Node
  Text<CharacterData
  Comment<Data
  CDATASection<Text
  DocumentType<Node
  Notation<Node
  Entity<Node
  EntityReference<Node
  ProcessingInstruction<Node

XML::DOM::Builder (xml/dom/builder.rb)

This module is a library for parsing XML file and building
XML tree.

XML::DOM::Visitor (xml/dom/visitor.rb)

SAX module (xml/sax.rb, xml/saxdriver.rb)

XML::ParserNS class (xml/parserns.rb)

XML::DOM (xml/dom2/)

An experimental implementation of DOM Level 2.
  • Copying

This extension module is copyrighted free software by Yoshida Masato.

You can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same term as Ruby or expat.

encoding.h and the functions of encoding map are part of XML::Parser for Perl.

Copyright (c) 1998 Larry Wall and Clark Cooper.
All rights reserved.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself.
  • Author

Yoshida Masato <[email protected]>

XPointer support is contributed by Masaki Fukushima 
    <[email protected]>
  • History

Feb 28, 2011 version 0.7.2  reverts once removed digest.rb
Dec 28, 2009 version 0.7.1  Ruby 1.9.1 encoding conversion
Dec 15, 2009 version 0.7.0  Ruby 1.9.1
Apr  5, 2004 version 0.6.8  fixes overflow, and taints output.
Sep 20, 2002 version 0.6.5  fixes reset
                            adds skippedEntity event for expat-1.95.4
                            adds XML::Parser.getFeatureList and
                            XML::Parser#useForeignDTD for expat-1.95.5
Jun 18, 2002 version 0.6.4  adds XML::Parser#reset for expat-1.95.3.
Mar 23, 2002 version 0.6.2  changes a layout under lib
                            changes the parent class of XML::Parser::Error
                            adds an experimental implementaion of DOM Level 2
                            adds XML::ParserNS (experimental)
Oct 15  2000 version 0.6.1  support expat-1.95.0 and expat-1.2
Aug  5, 2000 version 0.5.19 RDize xmltree.rb by TAKAHASHI Masayoshi
May 30, 2000 version 0.5.18 fix for Ruby 1.5
Oct 14, 1999 version 0.5.16 change some samples
Aug 18, 1999 version 0.5.15 support start/endDoctypeDecl event of
                            expat-19990728.
                            fix SAX driver bug.
Jun 29, 1999 version 0.5.14 support to parse external
                            parameter entities for
                            expat-19990626
Jun 10, 1999 version 0.5.13 support experimental SAX driver
                            support expat-1.1
May 13, 1999 version 0.5.12 fix extconf.rb bug
Apr 28, 1999 version 0.5.11 for expat-19990425, add NotStandalone
                            event, getSpecifiedAttributes method
                            and byteCount method
Apr 20, 1999 version 0.5.10 change xmldigest.rb for xss4j
Mar 29, 1999 version 0.5.9  change the object structure for Ruby 1.3
Mar 23, 1999 version 0.5.8  support the omission of keywords of XPointer
                            support to parse external parsed entities in 
                            XML::DOM::Builder
Mar  8, 1999 version 0.5.7  support start/endNamespaceDecl event of
                            expat-19990307.
Jan 25, 1999 version 0.5.6  class name aliases are defined in C module.
                            support cygwin.
Jan 14, 1999 version 0.5.5  support start/endCdataSection event of
                            expat-19981231
Jan 13, 1999 version 0.5.4  modify xmltree and xmltreebuilder
Jan 10, 1999 version 0.5.3  encoding map support
Dec  1, 1998 version 0.5.1  fix some bugs
Nov 24, 1998 version 0.5.0  support the test version of expat
Nov  5, 1998 version 0.4.18 fix some bugs, class name alias
                              XMLParserErorr        -> XML::Parser::Error
                            and change some internal functions.
Oct 28, 1998 version 0.4.17 mIDs are stored into static vars
Oct 28, 1998 version 0.4.16 change ID attribute support of XPointer.
                            Node#trim is now xml:space-aware
Oct 23, 1998 version 0.4.15 fix some bugs, add class name alias
                              XMLParser              -> XML::Parser
                              XML::SimpleTree        -> XML::DOM
                              XML::SimpleTreeBuilder -> XML::DOM::Builder
Oct 20, 1998 version 0.4.14 add better XPointer support by Masaki Fukushima
Sep 17, 1998 version 0.4.5 add methods to SimpleTree
Sep  8, 1998 version 0.4.4 change parser object type from
                           T_DATA to T_OBJECT (now can use
                           instance variables)
Sep  3, 1998 version 0.4.3 add isFinal flag, and stream
                           parsing facility
Sep  2, 1998 version 0.4.2 add external entity event and parser
Aug 14, 1998 version 0.3.3 support expat 1.0
Aug 12, 1998 version 0.3.2
Aug  4, 1998 version 0.3.1
Jul 17, 1998 version 0.3
Jul  3, 1998 version 0.2
Jul  1, 1998 version 0.1