XML::SA...rFactory(3)

🌸 NAME 🌸

okay bestie, this is the manual page for XML::SAX::ParserFactory — the header calls it XML::SA...rFactory(3), and it lives in the User Contributed Perl Documentation ✨. Short version: it's how you get a SAX parser. Periodt 💅.

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

use XML::SAX::ParserFactory;
use XML::SAX::XYZHandler;
my $handler = XML::SAX::XYZHandler->new();
my $p = XML::SAX::ParserFactory->parser(Handler => $handler);
$p->parse_uri("foo.xml");
# or $p->parse_string("<foo/>") or $p->parse_file($fh);

💅 DESCRIPTION 💅

XML::SAX::ParserFactory is a factory class that hands your application a Perl SAX2 XML parser. It's giving DBI energy — a front end for other parser classes 🫶. Every new SAX2 parser you install registers itself with XML::SAX, and after that it's available to every application that uses XML::SAX::ParserFactory to obtain a SAX parser.

But here's the plot twist: unlike DBI, XML/SAX parsers almost all work alike — especially if they subclass XML::SAX::Base, as they should — so instead of specifying the parser you want in the call to parser(), XML::SAX has several ways to automatically choose which parser to use 👑

• $XML::SAX::ParserPackage — if this package variable is set, then this package is require()d and an instance of this package is returned by calling the new() class method in that package. If it cannot be loaded or there is an error, an exception will be thrown 😭. The variable can also contain a version number:

$XML::SAX::ParserPackage = "XML::SAX::Expat (0.72)";

And the number will be treated as a minimum version number.

• Required features — it is possible to require features from the parsers. For example, you may wish for a parser that supports validation via a DTD. To do that, use the following code:

use XML::SAX::ParserFactory;
my $factory = XML::SAX::ParserFactory->new();
$factory->require_feature('http://xml.org/sax/features/validation');
my $parser = $factory->parser(...);

Alternatively, specify the required features in the call to the ParserFactory constructor:

my $factory = XML::SAX::ParserFactory->new(
        RequiredFeatures => {
             'http://xml.org/sax/features/validation' => 1,
             }
        );

If the features you have asked for are unavailable (for example the user might not have a validating parser installed), then an exception will be thrown 💀.

The list of known parsers is searched in reverse order, so it will always return the last installed parser that supports all of your requested features. (Note: this is subject to change if someone comes up with a better way of making this work.)

• SAX.ini — ParserFactory will search @INC for a file called SAX.ini, which is in a simple format:

# a comment looks like this,
; or like this, and are stripped anywhere in the file
key = value # SAX.in contains key/value pairs.

All whitespace is non-significant, bestie 🧚.

This file can contain either a line:

ParserPackage = MyParserModule (1.02)

Where MyParserModule is the module to load and use for the parser, and the number in brackets is a minimum version to load.

Or you can list required features:

http://xml.org/sax/features/validation = 1

And each feature with a true value will be required ⭐.

• Fallback — if none of the above works, the last parser installed on the user's system will be used. The XML::SAX package ships with a pure perl XML parser, XML::SAX::PurePerl, so that there will always be a fallback parser 🌈. No cap, there's always a safety net.

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Matt Sergeant, matt@sergeant.org 💌

🎀 LICENSE 🎀

This is free software, you may use it and distribute it under the same terms as Perl itself 🫶.

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okay bye bestie 💖 this page is from perl v5.42.0, dated 2024-03-04, and the manpage tag is XML::SA...rFactory(3). mwah 🎀✨