DocumentBuilder DocumentBuilderFactory transform Transformer TransformerFactory

Create XML File in Java using DOM parser example

Nikos MaravitsasMarch 10th, 2013Last Updated: March 10th, 2013

5 5,699 2 minutes read

In this tutorial we are going to see how to create XML File in Java using DOM parser. The basic idea is very simple. You construct the DOM object with the tree structure you want in the memory, and then you use a Transformer and a StreamResult in order to write the DOM object to a stream, in our case a File.

In short the basic steps one has to take in order to create an XML File withe a DOM Parser are:

Create a DocumentBuilder instance.
Create a Document from the above DocumentBuilder.
Create the elements you want using the Element class and its appendChild method.
Create a new Transformer instance and a new DOMSource instance.
Create a new StreamResult to the output stream you want to use.
Use transform method to write the DOM object to the output stream you want.

Let’s take a closer look at the code snippet that follows:

package com.javacodegeeks.java.core;

import java.io.File;
import javax.xml.parsers.DocumentBuilder;
import javax.xml.parsers.DocumentBuilderFactory;
import javax.xml.parsers.ParserConfigurationException;
import javax.xml.transform.Transformer;
import javax.xml.transform.TransformerException;
import javax.xml.transform.TransformerFactory;
import javax.xml.transform.dom.DOMSource;
import javax.xml.transform.stream.StreamResult;
import org.w3c.dom.Attr;
import org.w3c.dom.Document;
import org.w3c.dom.Element;

public class CreateXMLFileJava {

	public static final String xmlFilePath = "C:\\Users\\nikos7\\Desktop\\files\\xmlfile.xml";

	public static void main(String argv[]) {

		try {

			DocumentBuilderFactory documentFactory = DocumentBuilderFactory.newInstance();

			DocumentBuilder documentBuilder = documentFactory.newDocumentBuilder();

			Document document = documentBuilder.newDocument();

			// root element
			Element root = document.createElement("company");
			document.appendChild(root);

			// employee element
			Element employee = document.createElement("employee");

			root.appendChild(employee);

			// set an attribute to staff element
			Attr attr = document.createAttribute("id");
			attr.setValue("10");
			employee.setAttributeNode(attr);

			//you can also use staff.setAttribute("id", "1") for this

			// firstname element
			Element firstName = document.createElement("firstname");
			firstName.appendChild(document.createTextNode("James"));
			employee.appendChild(firstName);

			// lastname element
			Element lastname = document.createElement("lastname");
			lastname.appendChild(document.createTextNode("Harley"));
			employee.appendChild(lastname);

			// email element
			Element email = document.createElement("email");
			email.appendChild(document.createTextNode("james@example.org"));
			employee.appendChild(email);

			// department elements
			Element department = document.createElement("department");
			department.appendChild(document.createTextNode("Human Resources"));
			employee.appendChild(department);

			// create the xml file
			//transform the DOM Object to an XML File
			TransformerFactory transformerFactory = TransformerFactory.newInstance();
			Transformer transformer = transformerFactory.newTransformer();
			DOMSource domSource = new DOMSource(document);
			StreamResult streamResult = new StreamResult(new File(xmlFilePath));

			// If you use
			// StreamResult result = new StreamResult(System.out);
			// the output will be pushed to the standard output ...
			// You can use that for debugging 

			transformer.transform(domSource, streamResult);

			System.out.println("Done creating XML File");

		} catch (ParserConfigurationException pce) {
			pce.printStackTrace();
		} catch (TransformerException tfe) {
			tfe.printStackTrace();
		}
	}
}

xmlfile.xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="no"?>
<company>
	<employee id="10">
		<firstname>James</firstname>
		<lastname>Harley</lastname>
		<email>james@example.org</email>
		<department>Human Resources</department>
	</employee>
</company>

This was an example on how to create XML File in Java using DOM parser.