php simpleXML addChild containing existing text node

Question

I want to take an existing element and put a child inside of it. But I want the content of the pre-existing element to go inside the new element as well.

So I have Content and I want to end up with <a href="link">content</a> and I was hoping I could do this with php's simpleXML parser.

Here's what I've got so far:

$folnum = $xmldoc->xpath("//span[@class='folnum']");
foreach ($folnum as $indivfolnum)
{
    $child = $indivfolnum->addChild("a", "wholemsImage");
    $child->addAttribute("href", (string) $indivfolnum);
}

What I get from this is Content<a href="link">wholemsImage</a>.

Obviously the addChild() method is adding new content as well, which is not really what I want. I want it to replace the text-content.

hakre · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-22 13:54:31Z

2

I think this should work:

Save the Content to new variable: $link = (string) $indivfolnum;
Clear the  element: $indivfolnum[0] = "";
Then append new child.

Code example:

$folnum = $xmldoc->xpath("//span[@class='folnum']");
foreach ($folnum as $indivfolnum)
{
    $link = (string) $indivfolnum;
    $indivfolnum[0] = "";
    $child = $indivfolnum->addChild("a", "wholemsImage");
    $child->addAttribute("href", $link);
}

It creates the output as you want it:

<a href="Content">wholemsImage</a>

edited Dec 22, 2014 at 13:54

hakre

200k55 gold badges454 silver badges865 bronze badges

answered Sep 21, 2011 at 6:09

maialithar

3,1245 gold badges30 silver badges44 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

6 Comments

Jeff Over a year ago

That's a clever idea. But it looks to me like it doesn't work. I get the following error: Fatal error: Call to a member function addChild() on a non-object in /home/jeffr306/public_html/plaoul/text/textdisplay.php on line 145

Jeff Over a year ago

I think the problem that the addChild method only works on an "simpleXML" object. But when we declare $indivfolnum as empty we are declaring at it as absolutely null, not as an empty "simpleXML" object.

maialithar Over a year ago

@Jeff: here's a different approach: start one lvl higher (not from  element), check if ($body['span'] = 'content') $body['span'] = '<a href="link">content</a>'

maialithar Over a year ago

@Jeff: check Updating a node value with PHP's simpleXML and xpath not working and php and simpleXml - how to change node contents

hakre Over a year ago

SimpleXMLElement::addChild() requires at least PHP 5.1.3. You did get the fatal error because your PHP version was too low.

|

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

php simpleXML addChild containing existing text node

1 Answer 1

6 Comments

Your Answer

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

6 Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Linked

Related