Generate an XML file with ZF2

Question

I see when i started to learn ZF2 that we can use Zend\Config\Writer to write config in XML and put it into a file. I saw the PhP class DomDocument too. And i saw also SimpleXMLDocument.

I have to make a complex and extremely heavy XML with a lot of data from my Database. With DOMDocument, for 30% of the work, my code is already too complicated and not maintainable anymore.

This is a sample of how my XML has to be :

//...a lot more XML before
<Lines>
   <line lineNum="Num">

   </line>
   <line lineNum="Num2">

   </line>
</Lines>
//A lot more XML after

Those line can be created by a foreach loop. Zend\Config\Writer can't do that (especially for attribute parts) does it ?

My question is : Is exist a better way that i don't know yet for generate an XML with Zend Framework 2 ?

P.S :I'm looking for Object oriented programming solution.

Thanks for help.

Answer 1

I'm looking for an ZF2 internal solution too, @Hooli. Hoping to get some answers on Twitter too: What is the best way to generate / write #XML in #ZF2? Make use of \Zend\Feed\Writer or an external class like #SimpleXML? Any known module?

Maybe one can use the Zend\Feed\Writer for these cases as a workaround but I would prefer a ZF2 module or similar.

Otherwise @Tim is right, SimpleXML is a good solution. For bigger files XMLWriter is recommended.

Click here for a comparison of the two and DOM.

Answer 2

I just took a look at the Zend\Config\Writer\Xml class.

Fortunately an / the XMLWriter is already included via PHP Extension!

You can easily inspect the processConfig method() and adapt it to your needs. For my use case I even re-used the complete addBranch method().

About XMLWriter: PHP Manual

This extension represents a writer that provides a non-cached, forward-only means of generating streams or files containing XML data.