DOMNode::C14N

(PHP 5 >= 5.2.0, PHP 7, PHP 8)

DOMNode::C14N — Canonicalize nodes to a string

Description

public DOMNode::C14N(
    bool $exclusive = false,
    bool $withComments = false,
    ?array $xpath = null,
    ?array $nsPrefixes = null
): string|false

Canonicalize nodes to a string

Parameters

exclusive

Enable exclusive parsing of only the nodes matched by the provided xpath or namespace prefixes.

withComments

Retain comments in output.

xpath

An array of XPaths to filter the nodes by. Each entry in this array is an associative array with:

A required query key containing the XPath expression as a string.
An optional namespaces key containing an array that maps namespace prefixes (keys) to namespace URIs (values).

nsPrefixes

An array of namespace prefixes to filter the nodes by.

Return Values

Returns canonicalized nodes as a string or false on failure

Examples

Example #1 Example with XPath query

This example demonstrates advanced usage canonicalizing and filtering the nodes by an XPath query.

<?php

$dom = new DOMDocument();
$dom->loadXML(<<<XML
<root xmlns:food="urn:food">
    <!-- redundant namespace declaration will be canonicalized -->
    <food:fruit xmlns:food="urn:food">Apple</food:fruit>
    <food:fruit>Orange</food:fruit>
    <food:fruit>Pear</food:fruit>
    <!-- vegetables here -->
    <food:vegetable>Lettuce</food:vegetable>
</root>
XML);

echo $dom->C14N(true, false, [
    "query" => "./f:fruit|./f:fruit/text()",
    "namespaces" => ["f" => "urn:food"],
]);
?>

The above example will output:

<food:fruit>Apple</food:fruit><food:fruit>Orange</food:fruit><food:fruit>Pear</food:fruit>

Found A Problem?

Learn How To Improve This Page • Submit a Pull Request • Report a Bug

＋add a note

User Contributed Notes 3 notes

down

Rijk ¶

12 years ago

When working with (malformed) HTML, you're probably better off using DOMDocument's saveHTML() method instead. C14N() will attempt to make your HTML valid XML, for example by converting <br> to <br></br>.

So instead of:
$html = $Node->C14N();

Use:
$html = $Node->ownerDocument->saveHTML( $Node );

down

jorda at edpsciences dot org ¶

10 years ago

C14N() returns an empty string if the node is not included in the document tree:
<?php
$d = new DOMDocument('1.0');
$d->loadXML('<foo></foo>');
$n = $d->createElement('bar');
var_dump($n->C14N());
$d->documentElement->appendChild($n);
var_dump($n->C14N());
?>
output:
string(0) ""
string(11) "<bar></bar>"

down

lordbaco ¶

9 years ago

[edit by nielsdos: This has been fixed starting in PHP 8.4]



Good to know:



<< Due to a known issue in XML canonicalization in PHP, processing large metadata files in SimpleSAMLphp takes a big amount of resources, with that amount growing approximately by the square of the number of entities in the metadata set >>

https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=53655



We had the same issue with a 4.1 MB XML (105k lines). The sample code of ticket  #53655 takes 1h36 minute to canonicalize it!

＋add a note

DOMNode::C14N

Description

Parameters

Return Values

Examples

See Also

Found A Problem?

User Contributed Notes 3 notes