Getting The XML Root Element

After reading this section, you will be able to retrieve a root element from the XML document. The JAXP (Java APIs for XML Processing) provides a common interface for creating and using xml files using the standard SAX, DOM and XSLTs. Here you will see the given example to use DOM interface.

Description of program:

You need a XML document (file). Both Java and the XML file are kept in the same directory. This program takes a XML file as a String at the console . If the given file exists then it parses the document using parse() method . Before parsing the XML document you need a DocumentBuilder object. For creating this first of all you create a DocumentBuilderFactory. After parsing the XML document you get the node element using getDocumentElement() method. To get the root element use the getNodeName() method.

Here is the video insturction " How to get root node of XML in Java?":

Here is the XML File: Employee-Detail.xml

<?xml version = "1.0" ?>
<Employee-Detail>

<Employee>
<Emp_Id> E-001 </Emp_Id>
<Emp_Name> Vinod </Emp_Name>
<Emp_E-mail> [email protected] </Emp_E-mail>
</Employee>

<Employee>
<Emp_Id> E-002 </Emp_Id>
<Emp_Name> Amit </Emp_Name>
<Emp_E-mail> [email protected] </Emp_E-mail>
</Employee>

<Employee>
<Emp_Id> E-003 </Emp_Id>
<Emp_Name> Deepak </Emp_Name>
<Emp_E-mail> [email protected] </Emp_E-mail>
</Employee>

</Employee-Detail>

Here is the Java File: GetRootNode.java


import org.w3c.dom.*;

import javax.xml.parsers.*;

import java.io.*;



public class GetRootNode{

  public static void main(String[] args) {

  try{

  BufferedReader bf = new BufferedReader(

   new InputStreamReader(System.in));

  System.out.print("Enter xml file name: ");

  String str = bf.readLine();

  File file = new File(str);

  if (file.exists()){

  DocumentBuilderFactory fact = 

   DocumentBuilderFactory.newInstance();

  DocumentBuilder builder = fact.newDocumentBuilder();

  Document doc = builder.parse(str);

  Node node = doc.getDocumentElement();

  String root = node.getNodeName();

  System.out.println("Root Node: " + root);

  }

  else{

  System.out.println("File not found!");

  }

  }

  catch(Exception e){}

  }

}

Download this example.

Output of the program:

C:\vinod\xml>javac GetRootNode.java

C:\vinod\xml>java GetRootNode
Enter xml file name: Employee-Detail.xml
Root Node: Employee-Detail

Download source code of the project in Eclipse Project format

Getting The XML Root Element

Getting The XML Root Element

Getting The XML Root Element

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