Examples

Several of the following examples are based on the letter example described in the SDO documentation. The examples assume the XML Schema for the letter is contained in a file letter.xsd and the letter instance is in the file letter.xml. These two files are reproduced here:

<xsd:schema xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"
  xmlns:letter="http://letterSchema"
  targetNamespace="http://letterSchema">
  <xsd:element name="letters" type="letter:FormLetter"/>
  <xsd:complexType name="FormLetter" mixed="true">
    <xsd:sequence>
      <xsd:element name="date" minOccurs="0" type="xsd:string"/>
      <xsd:element name="firstName" minOccurs="0" type="xsd:string"/>
      <xsd:element name="lastName" minOccurs="0" type="xsd:string"/>
    </xsd:sequence>
  </xsd:complexType>
</xsd:schema>

<letter:letters xmlns:letter="http://letterSchema">
  <date>March 1, 2005</date>
  Mutual of Omaha
  Wild Kingdom, USA
  Dear
  <firstName>Casy</firstName>
  <lastName>Crocodile</lastName>
  Please buy more shark repellent.
  Your premium is past due.
</letter:letters>

Example #1 Loading, altering, and saving an XML document

The following example shows how an XML document can be loaded from a file, altered, and written back.

<?php
/**
 * Load, update, and save an XML document
 */
try {
   
$xmldas SDO_DAS_XML::create("letter.xsd");
   
$document $xmldas->loadFile("letter.xml");
   
$root_data_object $document->getRootDataObject();
   
$root_data_object->date "September 03, 2004";
   
$root_data_object->firstName "Anantoju";
   
$root_data_object->lastName "Madhu";
   
$xmldas->saveFile($document"letter-out.xml");
   echo 
"New file has been written:\n";
   print 
file_get_contents("letter-out.xml");
} catch (
SDO_Exception $e) {
   print(
$e->getMessage());
}
?>

An instance of the XML DAS is first obtained from the SDO_DAS_XML::create method, which is a static method of the SDO_DAS_XML class. The location of the xsd is passed as a parameter. Once we have an instance of the XML DAS initialised with a given schema, we can use it to load the instance document using the loadFile method. There is also a loadString method if you want to load an XML instance document from a string. If the instance document loads successfully, you will be returned an object of type SDO_DAS_XML_Document, on which you can call the getRootDataObject method to get the SDO data object which is the root of the SDO data graph. You can then use SDO operations to change the graph. In this example we alter the date, firstName, and lastName properties. Then we use the saveFile method to write the changed document back to the file system. The saveFile method has an optional extra integer argument which if specified will cause the XML DAS to format the XML, using the integer as the amount to indent by at each change in level on the document.

This will write the following to letter-out.xml.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<FormLetter xmlns="http://letterSchema" xsi:type="FormLetter" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
  <date>September 03, 2004</date>
  Mutual of Omaha
  Wild Kingdom, USA
  Dear
  <firstName>Anantoju</firstName>
  <lastName>Madhu</lastName>
  Please buy more shark repellent.
  Your premium is past due.
</FormLetter>

Example #2 Creating a new XML document

The previous example loaded the document from a file. This example shows how to create an SDO data graph in memory. In this example it is then saved to an XML string. Furthermore, because the letter contains both structured and unstructured content, it uses the Sequence API as well assignments to properties to construct the data graph.

<?php
/**
 * Create an XML document from scratch
 */
try {
   
$xmldas SDO_DAS_XML::create("letter.xsd");
   try {
       
$doc $xmldas->createDocument();
       
$rdo $doc->getRootDataObject();
       
$seq $rdo->getSequence();
       
$seq->insert("April 09, 2005"NULL'date');
       
$seq->insert("Acme Inc. "NULLNULL);
       
$seq->insert("United Kingdom. ");
       
$seq->insert("Dear"NULLNULL);
       
$seq->insert("Tarun"NULL"firstName");
       
$seq->insert("Nayaraaa"NULL"lastName");
       
$rdo->lastName "Nayar";
       
$seq->insert("Please note that your order number ");
       
$seq->insert(12345);
       
$seq->insert(" has been dispatched today. Thanks for your business with us.");
       print(
$xmldas->saveString($doc));
   } catch (
SDO_Exception $e) {
       print(
$e);
   }
} catch (
SDO_Exception $e) {
   print(
"Problem creating an XML document: " $e->getMessage());
}
?>

The createDocument method on the XML DAS returns a document object with a single root data object corresponding to an empty document element. The element name of the document element is known from the schema file. If there is any ambiguity about what the document element is, as there can be when more than one schema has been loaded into the same XML DAS, the element name and the namespace URI can be passed to the createDocument method.

This will emit the following output (line breaks have been inserted for readability):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<FormLetter xmlns="http://letterSchema" xsi:type="FormLetter" 
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
<date>April 09, 2005</date>
Acme Inc. United Kingdom. 
Dear
<firstName>Tarun</firstName>
<lastName>Nayar</lastName>
Please note that your order number 12345 has been 
dispatched today. Thanks for your business with us.
</FormLetter>

Example #3 Setting XML document properties

This third example shows you how to set the XML version and encoding on the document object. These will be used when the XML is written out. If no XML declaration is wanted at all (perhaps you want to generate the XML as a string to embed in something) then you can use the setXMLDeclaration method to suppress it.

<?php
/**
 * Illustrate the calls that control the XML declaration
 */
   
$xmldas SDO_DAS_XML::create("letter.xsd");
   
$document $xmldas->loadFile("letter.xml");
   
$document->setXMLVersion("1.1");
   
$document->setEncoding("ISO-8859-1");
   print(
$xmldas->saveString($document));
?>

The XML version and encoding are set in the XML declaration at the top of the XML document.

<?xml version="1.1" encoding="utf-8"?>
.../...

Example #4 Using an open type

This fourth example illustrates the use of an SDO open type and the use of the createDataObject method. For this example we use the following two schema:

<schema
  xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
  
  <element name="jungle">
    <complexType>
      <sequence>
        <any minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="unbounded"/>
      </sequence>
    </complexType>
  </element>
  
</schema>

Note the presence of the any element in the definition. This first schema defines the jungle complex type as containing a sequence of any other type. The other types that the example will use are defined in a second schema file:

<schema xmlns= "http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">

   <complexType name="snakeType">
     <sequence>
       <element name= "name" type="string"/>
       <element name= "length" type="positiveInteger" />
     </sequence>
   </complexType>

   <complexType name="bearType">
     <sequence>
       <element name= "name" type="string"/>
       <element name= "weight" type="positiveInteger" />
     </sequence>
   </complexType>

   <complexType name="pantherType">
     <sequence>
       <element name= "name" type="string"/>
       <element name= "colour" type="string" />
     </sequence>
   </complexType>

</schema>

Here is the example PHP code that uses these two schema files:

<?php

/**
 * Illustrate open types and the use of the addTypes() method
 */

$xmldas SDO_DAS_XML::create();
$xmldas->addTypes("jungle.xsd"); // this is an open type i.e. the xsd specifies it can contain "any" type
$xmldas->addTypes('animalTypes.xsd');

$baloo            $xmldas->createDataObject('','bearType');
$baloo->name      "Baloo";
$baloo->weight    800;

$bagheera         $xmldas->createDataObject('','pantherType');
$bagheera->name   "Bagheera";
$bagheera->colour 'inky black';

$kaa              $xmldas->createDataObject('','snakeType');
$kaa->name        "Kaa";
$kaa->length      25;

$document         $xmldas->createDocument();
$do               $document->getRootDataObject();
$do->bear         $baloo;
$do->panther      $bagheera;
$do->snake        $kaa;

print(
$xmldas->saveString($document,2));

?>

These two schema files are loaded into the XML DAS with first the create and addTypes methods. The createDataObject method is used to create three separate data objects. In each case the namespaceURI and typename of the type are passed to the createDataObject method: in this example the namespace URI is blank because no namespace is used in the schema. Once the three data objects - representing a bear, a panther and a snake - have been created, a document object is created with the createDocument method. In this case there is no ambiguity about what the document element of the document should be - as the second schema file only defines complex types, the document element can only be the global jungle element defined in the first schema. This document will have a single root data object corresponding to an empty document element jungle. As this is an open type, properties can be added at will. When the first assignment is made to $do->bear, a property bear is added to the root data object: likewise for the next two assignments. When the document is written out by the saveString method, the resulting document is:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<jungle xsi:type="jungle" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
  <bear xsi:type="bearType">
    <name>Baloo</name>
    <weight>800</weight>
  </bear>
  <panther xsi:type="pantherType">
    <name>Bagheera</name>
    <colour>inky black</colour>
  </panther>
  <snake xsi:type="snakeType">
    <name>Kaa</name>
    <length>25</length>
  </snake>
</jungle>

Example #5 Finding out what you can from the document

This example is intended to illustrate how you can find the element name and namespace of the document element from the XML Document object, and the SDO type and namespace from the root data object of the XML data object, and how they relate to one another. This can be difficult to understand because there are four method calls: two can be made against the Document object, and two that can be made against any data object including the root data object. Because of the rules that define how the SDO model is derived from the XML model, when the data object concerned is the root object that represents the document object for the document, only three possible values can come back from these four method calls.

The two method calls that can be made against the document are getRootElementName and getRootEelementURI. These return the element name and namespace of the document element, respectively.

The two method calls that can be made against any data object are getTypeName and getTypeNamespaceURI. These return the SDO type name and type namespace of the data object, respectively.

Always, calling getRootElementURI on the document object will return the same value as calling getNamespaceURI on the root data object. Essentially, the information is all derived from the first few lines of the schema file, where there are three distinct pieces of information. For illustration, here again are the first few lines of the letter.xsd that we used above.

<xsd:schema xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"
            xmlns:letter="http://letterSchema"
            targetNamespace="http://letterSchema">
            
  <xsd:element name="letters" type="letter:FormLetter"/>
  
  <xsd:complexType name="FormLetter" mixed="true">
    .../...

The three important values are:

  • letters, the name of the document element

  • FormLetter, the name of the complex type of the document element. This is also the name of the SDO type of the root data object.

  • http://letterSchema, the namespace to which the document element belongs. This is also the namespaceURI of the SDO type of the root data object.

It is part of the XML-SDO mapping rules that when the SDO model is built from the schema file, the typename and namespaceURI of the SDO types for the root element are taken from those of the complex type of the document element, where it exists. Hence in this example the typename of the root data object is FormLetter. In the event that there is no separate complex type definition for the document element, when the type is defined inline and is anonymous, the SDO type name will be the same as the element name.

The following program loads the letter document and checks the return values from each of the four calls.

<?php
/**
 * Finding out what you can about the document and document element
 * This can be quite hard to understand because there are four calls
 * Two calls are made against the document
 * Two calls are made against the root data object and its model
 * Because of the SDO-XML mapping rules and how the SDO model is derived
 * from the XML model, only three possible values can come back from these four calls.
 * Always, $document->getRootElementURI() == (type of root data object)->namespaceURI 
 * Essentially, it all comes form the first few lines of the xsd:
 * <xsd:schema xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"
 *   xmlns:letter="http://letterSchema"
 *   targetNamespace="http://letterSchema">
 *   <xsd:element name="letters" type="letter:FormLetter"/>
 */

$xmldas SDO_DAS_XML::create("letter.xsd");
$document $xmldas->loadFile("letter.xml");
$root_do $document->getRootDataObject();

/**
 * The "root element name" is the element name of the document element
 * in this case 'letters'
 * This matches the 'name' attribute of the document element in the xsd and matches
 * the element name from the xml
 */
echo "The document element name is " $document->getRootElementName() . "\n";
assert($document->getRootElementName() == 'letters'); // a property of the document

/**
 * The "root element URI" is the namespace part of the element name of the document element
 * in this case 'http://letterSchema' since 'letters' is in that namespace
 * This is taken from the xsd and matches the namespace picked up from the xml
 */
echo "The document element is in the namespace " $document->getRootElementURI() . "\n";
assert($document->getRootElementURI() == 'http://letterSchema'); // a property of the document

/**
 * The type name is taken from the SDO model
 * The XML-SDO mapping rules make this either:
 *   The name of the complexType if there is one (in this case there is)
 *   The document element name if there no complexType
 * This is taken from the xsd 
 */
echo "The type name of the root data object is " $root_do->getTypeName() . "\n";
assert($root_do->getTypeName() == 'FormLetter');  

/**
 * The type's namespaceURI is taken from the SDO model
 * The XML-SDO mapping rules ensure that this will always be the same as 
 * the namepace URI of the document element
 */
echo "The namespaceURI of the root data object is " $root_do->getTypeNamespaceURI() . "\n";
assert($root_do->getTypeNamespaceURI() == 'http://letterSchema'); 

?>

The output from this program is as follows:

The document element name is letters
The document element is in the namespace http://letterSchema
The type name of the root data object is FormLetter
The namespaceURI of the root data object is http://letterSchema

Example #6 Printing the SDO model

The XML DAS provides a simple means to see what types and properties have been loaded. The php "print" or "echo" instruction will print out the types and properties.

<?php
/**
 * Illustrate printing out the model
 */

$xmldas SDO_DAS_XML::create("letter.xsd");
print 
$xmldas;

?>

The output from this program is as follows:

object(SDO_XML_DAS)#1 {
18 types have been defined. The types and their properties are::
1. commonj.sdo:BigDecimal
2. commonj.sdo:BigInteger
3. commonj.sdo:Boolean
4. commonj.sdo:Byte
5. commonj.sdo:Bytes
6. commonj.sdo:ChangeSummary
7. commonj.sdo:Character
8. commonj.sdo:DataObject
9. commonj.sdo:Date
10. commonj.sdo:Double
11. commonj.sdo:Float
12. commonj.sdo:Integer
13. commonj.sdo:Long
14. commonj.sdo:Short
15. commonj.sdo:String
16. commonj.sdo:URI
17. http://letterSchema:FormLetter
    - date (commonj.sdo:String)
    - firstName (commonj.sdo:String)
    - lastName (commonj.sdo:String)
18. http://letterSchema:RootType
    - letters (http://letterSchema:FormLetter)