XML validation against XSD 1.1 with Xerces in Java

Question

I have installed Xerces through Maven:

<dependencies>
    <dependency>
        <groupId>junit</groupId>
        <artifactId>junit</artifactId>
        <version>4.11</version>
        <scope>test</scope>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
        <groupId>org.jdom</groupId>
        <artifactId>jdom</artifactId>
        <version>2.0.2</version>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
        <groupId>xerces</groupId>
        <artifactId>xercesImpl</artifactId>
        <version>2.11.0</version>
    </dependency>            
</dependencies>

I then tried the code given in this example from the Xerces FAQ to validate a XML file against a schema in version 1.1. This is my code:

private static void validateFile(File xmlFile, File xsdFile) throws SAXException, IOException
{
    // 1. Lookup a factory for the W3C XML Schema language
    SchemaFactory factory = SchemaFactory.newInstance("http://www.w3.org/XML/XMLSchema/v1.1");

    // 2. Compile the schema.
    File schemaLocation = xsdFile;
    Schema schema = factory.newSchema(schemaLocation);

    // 3. Get a validator from the schema.
    Validator validator = schema.newValidator();

    // 4. Parse the document you want to check.
    Source source = new StreamSource(xmlFile);

    // 5. Check the document
    try
    {
        validator.validate(source);
        System.out.println(xmlFile.getName() + " is valid.");
    }
    catch (SAXException ex)
    {
        System.out.println(xmlFile.getName() + " is not valid because ");
        System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
    }
}

The code only yields this exception:

java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: No SchemaFactory that implements the schema language specified by: http://www.w3.org/XML/XMLSchema/v1.1 could be loaded
at javax.xml.validation.SchemaFactory.newInstance(SchemaFactory.java:204)
at example.xml.XSDValidator.validateFile(XSDValidator.java:65)

Seems like I failed to configure/install Xerces correctly. Please help me get this working, the XML files force me to use the schema in 1.1, I got a normal validator for 1.0 running but I have huge problems with this. I appreciate every hint!

Answer 1

It looks that you need Xerces2 Java 2.11.0 (XML Schema 1.1) (Beta) version, which isn't in maven repository. You can download it from Xerces website, and install it to your local maven repository: mvn install:install-file -Dfile=xercesImpl.jar -DgroupId=xerces -DartifactId=xercesImpl -Dversion=2.11.0.beta -Dpackaging=jar Then you will be able to include it in your Maven project dependencies:

<dependency>
    <groupId>xerces</groupId>
    <artifactId>xercesImpl</artifactId>
    <version>2.11.0.beta</version>
</dependency>   

Answer 2

I will add another answer, because for me this dependency did not work (same error as described by OP):

<dependency>
  <groupId>xerces</groupId>
  <artifactId>xercesImpl</artifactId>
  <version>2.11.0</version>
</dependency>

I quess 2.11.0 should be newer than 2.11.0.beta, but it seems like xsd1.1 is not supported in that version !

Instead only the following dependency lead to a working XSD1.1 validation for me:

<dependency>
    <groupId>org.opengis.cite.xerces</groupId>
    <artifactId>xercesImpl-xsd11</artifactId>
    <version>2.12-beta-r1667115</version>
</dependency>

( Found in this SO thread: How to validate XML against XSD 1.1 in Java? )

Answer 3

I think they have added version 2.11 to maven now. The following dependency in Maven works out-of-the-box:

<dependency>
  <groupId>xerces</groupId>
  <artifactId>xercesImpl</artifactId>
  <version>2.11.0</version>
</dependency>

Answer 4

Xerces-J provides a "fully compliant XML Schema 1.1 implementation" since version 2.12.0, see release history here: https://xerces.apache.org/news.html.

Xerces2 Java 2.12.2 (XML Schema 1.1) - tar.gz [PGP] [SHA] Just got released earlier this week. https://xerces.apache.org/mirrors.cgi#notes