how to get Python XMLGenerator to output CDATA

Question

This is the Python equivalent of the Java question How to output a CDATA section from a Sax XmlHandler

Neither xml.sax.saxutils.XMLGenerator or lxml.sax.ElementTreeContentHandler says anything about CDATA sections. How can I get it to output CDATA?

Sampson

Answer 1

You could do it straight in your code using

from xml.sax.saxutils import XMLGenerator


xml = XMLGenerator()
xml.startDocument()
xml.startElement('item', {})
content = '<p>Stuff</p>'
cdata = '<![CDATA[{}]]>'.format(content)
xml.ignorableWhitespace(cdata)
xml.endElement('item')
xml.endDocument()

Or extend the XMLGenerator class with a new function

from xml.sax.saxutils import XMLGenerator


class _XMLGenerator(XMLGenerator):
    def cdata(self, content):
        cdata = '<![CDATA[{}]]>'.format(content)
        self.ignorableWhitespace(cdata)

xml = _XMLGenerator()
xml.startDocument()
xml.startElement('item', {})
content = '<p>Stuff</p>'
xml.cdata(content)
xml.endElement('item')
xml.endDocument()

The reason I don't use xml.characters(content) is because it calls the xml.sax.saxutils.escape function, which in turns escapes &, < and >.

Euboea

Answer 2

You can use xml.dom.minidom like this:

doc = xml.dom.minidom.Document()
article = doc.createElement('article')
content = doc.createCDATASection('<p>Any CDATA</p>')
article.appendChild(content)

Mandrill

Yes, the Document.createCDATASection() method works, but it is missing from the documentation: docs.python.org/3/library/xml.dom.html#document-objects. – Sluff