I'm trying to load a gzipped XML file using simplexml_load_file() PHP function, but I don't know how to decode it so I can use the data in it.
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http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.gzdecode.php or – Marek Sebera Aug 07 '11 at 15:21
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@Marek Sebera - This function (gzdecode) is in the manual but doesn't exist in PHP. – Aug 07 '11 at 15:59
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@Pawel: Sure it's part of PHP, you only need to have the extension enabled, see http://www.php.net/manual/en/zlib.installation.php - it's a very common extension. – hakre Aug 07 '11 at 16:14
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1I have this extension enabled and I can't use this function (I have PHP 5.3.6 installed). I can use e.g gzuncompress() so I have this extension enabled. – Aug 07 '11 at 16:31
3 Answers
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PHP has support for zlib compression build-in, just prefix the path of your file with the gzip'ed data with compress.zlib://
and you're done:
$xml = simplexml_load_file("compress.zlib://test.xml");
Works like a charm.

hakre
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X-Ref: [More links to related questions and PHP bugreports](http://stackoverflow.com/a/14978162/367456) – hakre Feb 20 '13 at 11:32
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/*EDIT print_r(gzdecoder(simplexml_load_file('test.xml')));
(Not sure without testing that the internals of what loads the xml
in *_load_file would see the gzipped content as invalid)
*/
$xml=simplexml_load_string(gzdecoder(file_get_contents('test.xml')));
print_r( $xml);
function gzdecoder($d){
$f=ord(substr($d,3,1));
$h=10;$e=0;
if($f&4){
$e=unpack('v',substr($d,10,2));
$e=$e[1];$h+=2+$e;
}
if($f&8){
$h=strpos($d,chr(0),$h)+1;
}
if($f&16){
$h=strpos($d,chr(0),$h)+1;
}
if($f&2){
$h+=2;
}
$u = gzinflate(substr($d,$h));
if($u===FALSE){
$u=$d;
}
return $u;
}

Lawrence Cherone
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Read it to a string using file_get_contents()
decompress it using gzuncompress()
and load string as XML using simplexml_load_string()
.

hakre
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Readgzfile() sends it directly to the browser, it doesn't return a string. – SnackerSWE Aug 07 '11 at 15:31
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3Hmm, why not just `simplexml_load_file("compress.zlib://test.xml");` [instead](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6973672/load-gzipped-xml-file-with-simplexml-load-file/6973867#6973867)? – hakre Aug 07 '11 at 16:12
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@Pawel: Checkout [Streams in PHP](http://www.php.net/manual/en/intro.stream.php), they are a powerful tool of the language, worth to know about. The concept exists in other languages, too, so it's just even better to know about ;) – hakre Aug 07 '11 at 19:16