dom-js

dom-js is a node module that creates a DOM from a String using sax-js.

DomJS has a parse() method that takes a string and a callback which is used when the DOM is ready, or if there is an error.

The object returned contains the root Element parsed to JavaScript objects.

dom-js returns the following object types

• Element
• Text
• Comment
• CDATASection
• ProcessingInstruction (only contained in the root Element)

An Element has a name, a map of attributes, and an array of children, so you can find everything.

You get a couple of convenience methods on Element text() and firstChild() usage is hopefully obvious and save some boiler plate null checking.

The Element object has a method toXml() which returns a String with whitespace in tact.

For example

var util = require('util');
var DomJS = require("dom-js").DomJS;

var domjs = new DomJS();

var string = '<xml><!-- the comment --><elem someAtt="fat &amp; red">Hello &amp; World</elem></xml>';
domjs.parse(string, function(err, dom) {
	console.log(util.inspect(dom, false, 23));
	console.log("serializes to : " + dom.toXml());
});

Examples

The /example/ folder in the npm package includes examples that console.log() the returned object.

Gotchas (that I can fix if it bothers anyone)

An empty tag will always be serialized in the short form .

ProcessingInstructions i.e. are ignored and dropped by default, for backwards compatibility. If you want to include processing instructions set the parseProcessingInstructions flag to true before calling parse().

var domjs = new DomJS();
domjs.parseProcessingInstructions = true;

The first|root Element will contain an array called processingInstructions if the input document has any, otherwise processingInstructions is undefined. Output of each processing instruction is always on a newline even if whitespace is different in the input document.

Sax strict parsing is on by default, and can be turned off by setting the strict flag.

var domjs = new DomJS();
domjs.strict = false;

An instance of DomJS should only be used once, but if you must reuse, call reset() before re-calling parse(). reset() does NOT reset the strict or processingInstructions flags.