# [fast-xml-parser](https://www.npmjs.com/package/fast-xml-parser)
[](#backers) [](#sponsors) [](https://snyk.io/test/github/naturalintelligence/fast-xml-parser)
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[](https://travis-ci.org/NaturalIntelligence/fast-xml-parser)
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[
](https://naturalintelligence.github.io/fast-xml-parser/)
[](https://npm.im/fast-xml-parser)
[quality-image]: http://npm.packagequality.com/shield/fast-xml-parser.svg?style=flat-square
[quality-url]: http://packagequality.com/#?package=fast-xml-parser
Validate XML, Parse XML to JS/JSON and vice versa, or parse XML to Nimn rapidly without C/C++ based libraries and no callback
To cover expenses, we're planning to launch [FXP Enterprise](https://github.com/NaturalIntelligence/fxp-ent) edition in parallel. Watch it for further updates, if you're interested.
## Users
List of some applications/projects using Fast XML Parser. (Raise an issue to submit yours)
The list of users is collected either from the list published by Github, cummunicated directly through mails/chat , or from other resources. If you feel that your name in the above list is incorrectly published or you're not the user of this library anymore then you can inform us to remove it. We'll do the necessary changes ASAP.
### Main Features
* Validate XML data syntactically
* Transform XML to JSON or Nimn
* Transform JSON back to XML
* Works with node packages, in browser, and in CLI (press try me button above for demo)
* Faster than any pure JS implementation.
* It can handle big files (tested up to 100mb).
* Various options are available to customize the transformation
* You can parse CDATA as a separate property.
* You can prefix attributes or group them to a separate property. Or they can be ignored from the result completely.
* You can parse tag's or attribute's value to primitive type: string, integer, float, hexadecimal, or boolean. And can optionally decode for HTML char.
* You can remove namespace from tag or attribute name while parsing
* It supports boolean attributes, if configured.
## How to use
To use it in **NPM package** install it first
`$npm install fast-xml-parser` or using [yarn](https://yarnpkg.com/) `$yarn add fast-xml-parser`
To use it from a **CLI** install it globally with the `-g` option.
`$npm install fast-xml-parser -g`
To use it on a **webpage** include it from a [CDN](https://cdnjs.com/libraries/fast-xml-parser)
### XML to JSON
```js
var jsonObj = parser.parse(xmlData [,options] );
```
```js
var parser = require('fast-xml-parser');
var he = require('he');
var options = {
attributeNamePrefix : "@_",
attrNodeName: "attr", //default is 'false'
textNodeName : "#text",
ignoreAttributes : true,
ignoreNameSpace : false,
allowBooleanAttributes : false,
parseNodeValue : true,
parseAttributeValue : false,
trimValues: true,
cdataTagName: "__cdata", //default is 'false'
cdataPositionChar: "\\c",
parseTrueNumberOnly: false,
arrayMode: false, //"strict"
attrValueProcessor: (val, attrName) => he.decode(val, {isAttributeValue: true}),//default is a=>a
tagValueProcessor : (val, tagName) => he.decode(val), //default is a=>a
stopNodes: ["parse-me-as-string"]
};
if( parser.validate(xmlData) === true) { //optional (it'll return an object in case it's not valid)
var jsonObj = parser.parse(xmlData,options);
}
// Intermediate obj
var tObj = parser.getTraversalObj(xmlData,options);
var jsonObj = parser.convertToJson(tObj,options);
```
As you can notice in the above code, validator is not embedded with in the parser and expected to be called separately. However, you can pass `true` or validation options as 3rd parameter to the parser to trigger validator internally. It is same as above example.
```js
try{
var jsonObj = parser.parse(xmlData,options, true);
}catch(error){
console.log(error.message)
}
```
Validator returns the following object in case of error;
```js
{
err: {
code: code,
msg: message,
line: lineNumber,
},
};
```
#### Note: [he](https://www.npmjs.com/package/he) library is used in this example
OPTIONS :
* **attributeNamePrefix** : prepend given string to attribute name for identification
* **attrNodeName**: (Valid name) Group all the attributes as properties of given name.
* **ignoreAttributes** : Ignore attributes to be parsed.
* **ignoreNameSpace** : Remove namespace string from tag and attribute names.
* **allowBooleanAttributes** : a tag can have attributes without any value
* **parseNodeValue** : Parse the value of text node to float, integer, or boolean.
* **parseAttributeValue** : Parse the value of an attribute to float, integer, or boolean.
* **trimValues** : trim string values of an attribute or node
* **decodeHTMLchar** : This options has been removed from 3.3.4. Instead, use tagValueProcessor, and attrValueProcessor. See above example.
* **cdataTagName** : If specified, parser parse CDATA as nested tag instead of adding it's value to parent tag.
* **cdataPositionChar** : It'll help to covert JSON back to XML without losing CDATA position.
* **parseTrueNumberOnly**: if true then values like "+123", or "0123" will not be parsed as number.
* **arrayMode** : When `false`, a tag with single occurrence is parsed as an object but as an array in case of multiple occurences. When `true`, a tag will be parsed as an array always excluding leaf nodes. When `strict`, all the tags will be parsed as array only. When instance of `RegEx`, only tags will be parsed as array that match the regex. When `function` a tag name is passed to the callback that can be checked.
* **tagValueProcessor** : Process tag value during transformation. Like HTML decoding, word capitalization, etc. Applicable in case of string only.
* **attrValueProcessor** : Process attribute value during transformation. Like HTML decoding, word capitalization, etc. Applicable in case of string only.
* **stopNodes** : an array of tag names which are not required to be parsed. Instead their values are parsed as string.
To use from command line
```bash
$xml2js [-ns|-a|-c|-v|-V] [-o outputfile.json]
$cat xmlfile.xml | xml2js [-ns|-a|-c|-v|-V] [-o outputfile.json]
```
* -ns : To include namespaces (by default ignored)
* -a : To ignore attributes
* -c : To ignore value conversion (i.e. "-3" will not be converted to number -3)
* -v : validate before parsing
* -V : only validate
To use it on webpage
```js
var result = parser.validate(xmlData);
if (result !== true) console.log(result.err);
var jsonObj = parser.parse(xmlData);
```
### JSON / JS Object to XML
```js
var Parser = require("fast-xml-parser").j2xParser;
//default options need not to set
var defaultOptions = {
attributeNamePrefix : "@_",
attrNodeName: "@", //default is false
textNodeName : "#text",
ignoreAttributes : true,
cdataTagName: "__cdata", //default is false
cdataPositionChar: "\\c",
format: false,
indentBy: " ",
supressEmptyNode: false,
tagValueProcessor: a=> he.encode(a, { useNamedReferences: true}),// default is a=>a
attrValueProcessor: a=> he.encode(a, {isAttributeValue: isAttribute, useNamedReferences: true})// default is a=>a
};
var parser = new Parser(defaultOptions);
var xml = parser.parse(json_or_js_obj);
```
OPTIONS :
With the correct options, you can get the almost original XML without losing any information.
* **attributeNamePrefix** : Identify attributes with this prefix otherwise treat them as a tag.
* **attrNodeName**: Identify attributes when they are grouped under single property.
* **ignoreAttributes** : Don't check for attributes. Treats everything as tag.
* **encodeHTMLchar** : This option has been removed from 3.3.4. Use tagValueProcessor, and attrValueProcessor instead. See above example.
* **cdataTagName** : If specified, parse matching tag as CDATA
* **cdataPositionChar** : Identify the position where CDATA tag should be placed. If it is blank then CDATA will be added in the last of tag's value.
* **format** : If set to true, then format the XML output.
* **indentBy** : indent by this char `when` format is set to `true`
* **supressEmptyNode** : If set to `true`, tags with no value (text or nested tags) are written as self closing tags.
* **tagValueProcessor** : Process tag value during transformation. Like HTML encoding, word capitalization, etc. Applicable in case of string only.
* **attrValueProcessor** : Process attribute value during transformation. Like HTML encoding, word capitalization, etc. Applicable in case of string only.
## Benchmark
#### XML to JSON
report
| file size | fxp 3.0 validator (rps) | fxp 3.0 parser (rps) | xml2js 0.4.19 (rps) |
| ---------- | ----------------------- | ------------------- | ------------------- |
| 1.5k | 16581.06758 | 14032.09323 | 4615.930805 |
| 1.5m | 14918.47793 | 13.23366098 | 5.90682005 |
| 13m | 1.834479235 | 1.135582008 | -1 |
| 1.3k with CDATA | 30583.35319 | 43160.52342 | 8398.556349 |
| 1.3m with CDATA | 27.29266471 | 52.68877009 | 7.966000795 |
| 1.6k with cdata,prolog,doctype | 27690.26082 | 41433.98547 | 7872.399268 |
| 98m | 0.08473858148 | 0.2600104004 | -1 |
* -1 indicates error or incorrect output.
#### JSON to XML
report
| file size | fxp 3.2 js to xml | xml2js 0.4.19 builder |
|------------|-----------------|-----------------|
| 1.3k | 160148.9801 | 10384.99401|
| 1.1m | 173.6374831 | 8.611884025|
### Worth to mention
- **[BigBit standard)](https://github.com/amitguptagwl/bigbit)** : A standard to represent any number in the universe in comparatively less space and without precision loss. A standard to save memory to represent any text string in comparision of UTF encodings.
- **[imglab](https://github.com/NaturalIntelligence/imglab)** : Speedup and simplify image labeling / annotation. Supports multiple formats, one click annotation, easy interface and much more. There are more than half million images are being annotated every month using this tool.
- [stubmatic](https://github.com/NaturalIntelligence/Stubmatic) : Create fake webservices, DynamoDB or S3 servers, Manage fake/mock stub data, Or fake any HTTP(s) call.
- **[अनुमार्गक (anumargak)](https://github.com/NaturalIntelligence/anumargak)** : The fastest and simple router for node js web frameworks with many unique features.
- [मुनीम (Muneem)](https://github.com/muneem4node/muneem) : A webframework made for all team members. Fast and Featured.
- [शब्दावली (shabdawali)](https://github.com/amitguptagwl/shabdawali) : Amazing human like typing effects beyond your imagination.
## Contributors
This project exists thanks to [all](graphs/contributors) the people who contribute. [[Contribute](docs/CONTRIBUTING.md)].
## Backers
Thank you to all our backers! 🙏 [[Become a backer](https://opencollective.com/fast-xml-parser#backer)]
## Sponsors
Support this project by becoming a sponsor. Your logo will show up here with a link to your website. [[Become a sponsor](https://opencollective.com/fast-xml-parser#sponsor)]
# License
* MIT License