How to delete empty tag from XML

[ram gaurav]

Hi

I am having one XML file with following data.

  <MAIN>
  <Test>
        <name>A</name>
        <name>B</name>
        [B]<name/>[/B]
  </Test>
</MAIN>  

Now , in above file one NAME tag is empty.So i want that while traversing through XML file , i have to delete that blank record.

Can you please tell me that how to get that.

Thanks
Ram

[Paul Sturrock]

The <name /> has no children (since the content of an element == a child element itself). You could just match on that and delete it.

[Purushoth Thambu]

You can run a simple style sheet to filter out the empty element. The below one should work for you.

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
<xsl:strip-space elements="*"/>
<xsl:template match="/">
  <xsl:apply-templates/>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template match="node()|@*">
     <xsl:if test="string-length(.) > 0 ">
<xsl:copy>
   <xsl:apply-templates/>
 </xsl:copy>
     </xsl:if>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
 

[ram gaurav]

Sir , Thanks a lot for your reply.

But i am new to XML so can you please tell me that how to run stylesheet.

Thanks
Ram

[Purushoth Thambu]

Download Xalan for Java the below URL explains how to run the stylesheet.
http://xml.apache.org/xalan-j/commandline.html
You can use any XSLT parser, all you have to do is consult the doc on how to run them. I haven't used the xsl parser that comes with jdk