exist-ixml-xar

A package that provides a function for invisible XML parsing.

Please note that this is not the 'official' XQuery 4.0 function, see below. If you want to use the 'official' function in eXist-db 6.2.x, have a look at this branch in my fork of eXist-db.

Usage

It is assumed that you have already installed eXist-db and Maven.

Download or clone or fork the git repository, which has all the source files. In the directory where you have just downloaded the project, do maven install. This will create a .xar file in the target directory.

Start eXist-db.

Install the .xar file into eXist, using the package manager.

Open eXide, and enter the following in a new XQuery document.

import module namespace ixml = "http://rakensi.com/exist-db/xquery/functions/ixml";

let $grammar := ``[
 date = year, -'-', month, -'-', day .
 year = d, d, d, d .
month = '0', d | '1', ['0'|'1'|'2'] .
  day = ['0'|'1'|'2'], d | '3', ['0'|'1'] .
   -d = ['0'-'9'] .
]``
let $ixml-parse := ixml:invisible-xml($grammar, map{})
return $ixml-parse('2024-06-07')

Press the 'Eval' button. The output should look like:

<date>
    <year>2024</year>
    <month>06</month>
    <day>07</day>
</date>

Notes

In XQuery 4.0 there will be a function

fn:invisible-xml(
  $grammar  as item()?  := (),
  $options  as map(*)?  := {}
)  as fn(xs:string) as item()

At some point, this will be implemented in eXist-db. Until then, you can use the ixml:invisible-xml function provided by this package.

When the official invisible-xml function becomes available, you should remove the ixml module import from the example, and rewrite it as:

xquery version "3.1";
let $grammar := ``[
 date = year, -'-', month, -'-', day .
 year = d, d, d, d .
month = '0', d | '1', ['0'|'1'|'2'] .
  day = ['0'|'1'|'2'], d | '3', ['0'|'1'] .
   -d = ['0'-'9'] .
]``
let $ixml-parse := fn:invisible-xml($grammar, map{})
return $ixml-parse('2023-06-07')