how do I extract text from a nested xml using xmlpullparser in android?

Question

<doc>
 <element>
  text
     <item>
     text1
     </item>
     <item>
     text2
     </item>
  text3
 </element>
 <element>
  another text
 </element>


 ...
</doc>

And I want to extract text to an string like this:

 "text text1 text2 text3"

"item" tags are nested inside "element"

Im using xmlpullparser in Android but I could use any other parser if it make things easier. tx.

If strings are all you're after, why not just you use the strings.xml file. Its a lot simpler. — Mike D, Feb 27 '12 at 17:06
if you want text without the tags, you can use String.replace with a regex or something — njzk2, Feb 27 '12 at 17:08
I'm not sure of what you mean. strings.xml from android SDK? this is a third-party file I need to parse — butelo, Feb 27 '12 at 17:10
Yes but the tag item is different in some cases has attributes and so on.. The real file is wide more complicated than this snippet. — butelo, Feb 27 '12 at 17:14

score 13 · Accepted Answer · answered Feb 27 '12 at 17:37

I parse similar xml files. Here is an example. You'll need to add error checking as appropriate.

void loadXML(XmlPullParser xpp) {
    int eventType = xpp.next();
    while (eventType != XmlPullParser.END_DOCUMENT) {
        if (eventType == XmlPullParser.START_TAG && 0 == XML_ELEMENT_TAG.compareTo(xpp.getName())) {
            loadElement(xpp);
        }

        eventType = xpp.next();   
    }
}

private void loadElement(XmlPullParser xpp) {

    int eventType = xpp.getEventType();
    if ( eventType == XmlPullParser.START_TAG && 0 == XML_ELEMENT_TAG.compareTo(xpp.getName()) ) {
        eventType = xpp.next();
        while ( eventType != XmlPullParser.END_TAG || 0 != XML_ELEMENT_TAG.compareTo(xpp.getName()) ) {
            if (eventType == XmlPullParser.START_TAG &&     0 == XML_ITEM_TAG.compareTo(xpp.getName())) {
                loadItem(xpp);
            }

            eventType = xpp.next();   
        }
    } 
}

private void loadItem(XmlPullParser xpp) {

    int eventType = xpp.getEventType();
    if ( eventType == XmlPullParser.START_TAG && 0 == XML_ITEM_TAG.compareTo(xpp.getName()) ) {

        eventType = xpp.next();
        while ( eventType != XmlPullParser.END_TAG || 0 != XML_ITEM_TAG.compareTo(xpp.getName()) ) {

            // Get attributes.
            String  attr = xpp.getAttributeValue(null, XML_MY_ATTR); 
            String  text = null;

            // Get item text if present.
            eventType = xpp.next();
            while ( eventType != XmlPullParser.END_TAG || 0 != XML_ITEM_TAG.compareTo(xpp.getName()) ) {
                if ( eventType == XmlPullParser.TEXT ) {
                    text = xpp.getText();
                } 

                eventType = xpp.next();
            }

            eventType = xpp.next();   
        }
    } 
}

It worked! Not exactly like this because of my XML, but enough to put me on my own feet. tx a lot — butelo, Feb 28 '12 at 17:08

score -4 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 27 '12 at 17:32

-4

Have you had a look at the Android documentation for XMLPullParser? It pretty easy to follow. Let us know if that solves your problem.

answered Feb 27 '12 at 17:32

Mike D

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I did and also xmlpullparser website. Didn't find about nested tags. – butelo Feb 27 '12 at 17:37
@MikeD Negative. That documentation is not easy to follow for nested xml tags. – IgorGanapolsky Mar 11 '14 at 22:00

how do I extract text from a nested xml using xmlpullparser in android?

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