PHP Manual: Interprets a string of XML into an object

Description

SimpleXMLElement simplexml_load_string ( string $data [, string $class_name = "SimpleXMLElement" [, int $options = 0 [, string $ns = "" [, bool $is_prefix = false ]]]] )

Takes a well-formed XML string and returns it as an object.

Parameters

data: A well-formed XML string
class_name: You may use this optional parameter so that simplexml_load_string will return an object of the specified class. That class should extend the SimpleXMLElement class.
options: Since PHP 5.1.0 and Libxml 2.6.0, you may also use the options parameter to specify additional Libxml parameters.
ns: Namespace prefix or URI.
is_prefix: TRUE if ns is a prefix, FALSE if it's a URI; defaults to FALSE.

Return Values

Returns an object of class SimpleXMLElement with properties containing the data held within the xml document, or FALSE on failure.

Errors/Exceptions

Produces an E_WARNING error message for each error found in the XML data.

Tip

Use libxml_use_internal_errors to suppress all XML errors, and libxml_get_errors to iterate over them afterwards.

Examples

Example #1 Interpret an XML string


<?php
$string = <<<XML
<?xml version='1.0'?> 
<document>
 <title>Forty What?</title>
 <from>Joe</from>
 <to>Jane</to>
 <body>
  I know that's the answer -- but what's the question?
 </body>
</document>
XML;

$xml = simplexml_load_string($string);

print_r($xml);
?>

The above example will output:

SimpleXMLElement Object
(
  [title] => Forty What?
  [from] => Joe
  [to] => Jane
  [body] =>
   I know that's the answer -- but what's the question?
)

At this point, you can go about using $xml->body and such.