Unable to parse XML structure using DOM library

[Viegas]

Hi all,

I'm trying to parse this XML structure:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<parameter name="OfferMap" type="Map">
	<parameter name="OtherMap" type="Map">
	</parameter>
	<parameter name="YetAnotherMap" type="Map">
	</parameter>
	<parameter name="Contract" type="Map">
		<parameter name="OtherMap" type="Map">
		</parameter>
		<parameter name="VoiceGenOfferInfo" type="Map">
			<parameter name="something" type="String">214</parameter>
			<parameter name="something" type="String">214</parameter>
			<parameter name="something" type="String">214</parameter>
			<parameter name="something" type="String">214</parameter>
			<parameter name="something" type="String">214</parameter>
			<parameter name="something" type="String">214</parameter>
			<parameter name="ServicesToActivate" type="Array">
				<parameter type="Map">
					<parameter name="ServicePackage" type="String">577</parameter>
					<parameter name="service" type="String">1954</parameter>
				</parameter>
				<parameter type="Map">
					<parameter name="ServicePackage" type="String">577</parameter>
					<parameter name="service" type="String">1955</parameter>
				</parameter>
			</parameter>
		</parameter>
	</parameter>
</parameter>

but the following line:

initialDocument.getChildNodes().item(0).getChildNodes().item(5).getChildNodes().item(3).getChildNodes().item(13)

where initialDocument represents a DOMDocument with the XML posted above, only returns:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<parameter name="ServicesToActivate" type="Array">
	<parameter type="Map">
		<parameter name="ServicePackage" type="String">577</parameter>
		<parameter name="service" type="String">1955</parameter>
	</parameter>
</parameter>

What am i doing wrong? Why does the first map disapear (the one were the service is 1954)?

How can i obtain the values for both the vars servicepackage and service?

TIA

 

[travishein]

Sometimes DOM interprets the white space in an XML file as if they were TEXT nodes, instead of the visible ELEMENT nodes wee see and expect.

So, instead of doing the long nested item().getChildNodes().item,
maybe break it up to nested blocks where

NodeList n1 = initialDocument.getChildNodes();
for (int i = 0; i < n1.getLength(); i++) {
 Node n = n1.item(i);
 if (n.getNodeType == Node.ELEMENT_NODE) {
   NodeList n2 = n.getChildNodes();
   // and so on.
 }
}

Another option, if you are able to, have you tried out the StAX API? It is a bit more elegant for reading XML files, and is bundled into Java 1.6