Add XML support via a library or helper

[brettalton]

As per http://ca3.php.net/xml.

XML takes a lot of markup to display an XML file:

<?php
$file = "data.xml";
$depth = array();

function startElement($parser, $name, $attrs)
{
    global $depth;
    for ($i = 0; $i < $depth[$parser]; $i++) {
        echo "  ";
    }
    echo "$name\n";
    $depth[$parser]++;
}

function endElement($parser, $name)
{
    global $depth;
    $depth[$parser]--;
}

$xml_parser = xml_parser_create();
xml_set_element_handler($xml_parser, "startElement", "endElement");
if (!($fp = fopen($file, "r"))) {
    die("could not open XML input");
}

while ($data = fread($fp, 4096)) {
    if (!xml_parse($xml_parser, $data, feof($fp))) {
        die(sprintf("XML error: %s at line %d",
                    xml_error_string(xml_get_error_code($xml_parser)),
                    xml_get_current_line_number($xml_parser)));
    }
}
xml_parser_free($xml_parser);
?> 

Or convert XML to HTML:

<?php
$file = "data.xml";
$map_array = array(
    "BOLD"     => "B",
    "EMPHASIS" => "I",
    "LITERAL"  => "TT"
);

function startElement($parser, $name, $attrs)
{
    global $map_array;
    if (isset($map_array[$name])) {
        echo "<$map_array[$name]>";
    }
}

function endElement($parser, $name)
{
    global $map_array;
    if (isset($map_array[$name])) {
        echo "</$map_array[$name]>";
    }
}

function characterData($parser, $data)
{
    echo $data;
}

$xml_parser = xml_parser_create();
// use case-folding so we are sure to find the tag in $map_array
xml_parser_set_option($xml_parser, XML_OPTION_CASE_FOLDING, true);
xml_set_element_handler($xml_parser, "startElement", "endElement");
xml_set_character_data_handler($xml_parser, "characterData");
if (!($fp = fopen($file, "r"))) {
    die("could not open XML input");
}

while ($data = fread($fp, 4096)) {
    if (!xml_parse($xml_parser, $data, feof($fp))) {
        die(sprintf("XML error: %s at line %d",
                    xml_error_string(xml_get_error_code($xml_parser)),
                    xml_get_current_line_number($xml_parser)));
    }
}
xml_parser_free($xml_parser);
?> 

Lets add XML support as a helper for doing these sorts of functions (ie: xml::xml_to_html();)

[brettalton]

This has major implications on the feeds library because you will be able to not just parse(), but create() feeds as well.

feeds::parse(); feeds::create();

[user]

Classic is very complicated for read and parse, use:

http://php.net/manual/en/ref.simplexml.php

Using only objects

[Shadowhand]

[SimpleXML] is a PHP5 extension that is enabled by default since PHP 5.0. It provides a very clean API and is easy to use.

Rather than creating a (slower) wrapper, I recommend using SimpleXML itself.