XML and CFML

CF-XML.md

#Working with XML in ColdFusion

Cheatsheet with code examples to read, create and search xml files

ColdFusion provides many built-in functions for doing all sort of XML based operations.

###Reading XML Document Read the document then passes it to the parser to create an XML object

<cffile action="read" file="#ExpandPath('./some.xml')#" variable="myXML" />
<cfset myDoc=XmlParse(myXML) />

The XmlParse can also read the file so we can avoid one step here.

<cfset myDoc=XmlParse(ExpandPath("./some.xml")) />

###Generating an XML with data from a database

<!--- Get some data from the database --->
<cfquery name="getData" datasource="ts24.travel">
	SELECT * FROM TestData
</cfquery>

<!--- Create the XML with the getData var --->
<cfxml variable="testXML">
<cfoutput query="getData">
	<id>#getData.id#</id>
	<myDataAlfa>#getData.myDataAlfa#</myDataAlfa>
	<myDataAlfa>#getData.myDataAlfa#</myDataAlfa>
	<myDataInt>#getData.myDataInt#</myDataInt>
</cfoutput>
</cfxml>

<!--- Write the XML out in a document --->
<cffile action="write" file="#ExpandPath('./out.xml')#" output="#testXML#" />

<!--- Dump Output to the Browser --->
<cfdump var="#testXML#" />

###Parsing XML Coldfusion has one function to parse xml files. This function has a casesensitive property that can be enabled or disabled when reading the XML file. xmlParse can read xml documents from a local file, URL or a string containing XML code. It can also validate XML based on a DTD or schema.

In this example I'm reading a local file

<cfset myDoc=xmlParse("./testXML.xml", [true || false (default is false)]*) 

xmlParse takes 2 arguments, the path where the file is located and casesensitive true or false.

The XML file looks like this:

<testXML>
	<art>
		<itemName Type="1">Art Name</item>
	</art>
</testXML>

We can access to the root of the document as follow if the case sensitive is false:

myDoc.testxml

if the case sensitive is true, this will produce an error. The right way to do it would be like this:

myDoc.xmlRoot

The same is also true with nodes and attributes

case sensitive false:

myDoc.testXML.art[1].itemname.xmltext

case sensitive true:

myDoc.xmlRoot.xmlChildren[1]["itemName"]

###XML to String

<cfset xmlString=toString(myDoc) />

###Looping over XML Knowing the structure of the document

<cfloop array="#myDoc.testxml.art.xmlchildren#" index="i">
	<cfoutput>
		name: #i.itemName.xmlText#<br/>
	</cfoutput>
	<br/>
</cfloop>

###Setting XML Node Value

<cfloop array="#myDoc.testXML.art.xmlchildren#" index="i">
	<!--- set a new name --->
	<cfset i.itemName.xmlText = "Jonny" />
</cfloop>

###Convert XML to Query Result Set

<cfscript>
artQuery = QueryNew("artistid, artid, name, description, image, price, sold"); 
queryAddRow(artQuery, arraylen(myDoc.art.piece));

for (i = 1; i lte arraylen(myDoc.art.piece); i++){
    thisItem = mydoc.art.piece[i];
    QuerySetCell(artQuery, "artistid", mydoc.art.xmlAttributes.artistid, i);
    QuerySetCell(artQuery, "artid", thisItem.xmlAttributes.id, i);
    QuerySetCell(artQuery, "sold", thisItem.xmlAttributes.available, i);
    QuerySetCell(artQuery, "name", thisItem.artname.xmltext, i);
    QuerySetCell(artQuery, "description", thisItem.description.xmltext, i);
    QuerySetCell(artQuery, "image", thisItem.image.xmltext, i);
    QuerySetCell(artQuery, "price", thisItem.price.xmltext, i);
}

writedump(artQuery);
</cfscript>

###Searching XML

<cffile action="read" file"#ExpandPath('./out.xml')#" variable="myXML" />

<cfset myDoc=XmlParse(myXML) />
<cfscript>
	params = structNew();
	params["artname"] = "Mary";
</cfscript>

<cfset searchRes=xmlSearch(myXML, '//piece/artname[. = $artname], params) />

<cfdump var="#searchRes[1].xmlParent#" />