Implementing a custom Decoder in Swift 4 Implementing a custom Decoder in Swift 4 xml xml

Implementing a custom Decoder in Swift 4


I haven't had a chance to turn my code into a framework yet, but you can take a look at my Github Repository that implements both a custom decoder and encoder for XML.

Link: https://github.com/ShawnMoore/XMLParsing

The encoder and decoder resides in the XML folder of the repo. It is based on Apple's JSONEncoder and JSONDecoder with changes to fit the XML standard.


Differences between XMLDecoder and JSONDecoder

  1. XMLDecoder.DateDecodingStrategy has an extra case titled keyFormatted. This case takes a closure that gives you a CodingKey, and it is up to you to provide the correct DateFormatter for the provided key. This is simply a convenience case on the DateDecodingStrategy of JSONDecoder.
  2. XMLDecoder.DataDecodingStrategy has an extra case titled keyFormatted. This case takes a closure that gives you a CodingKey, and it is up to you to provide the correct data or nil for the provided key. This is simply a convenience case on the DataDecodingStrategy of JSONDecoder.
  3. If the object conforming to the Codable protocol has an array, and the XML being parsed does not contain the array element, XMLDecoder will assign an empty array to the attribute. This is because the XML standard says if the XML does not contain the attribute, that could mean that there are zero of those elements.

Differences between XMLEncoder and JSONEncoder

  1. Contains an option called StringEncodingStrategy, this enum has two options, deferredToString and cdata. The deferredToString option is default and will encode strings as simple strings. If cdata is selected, all strings will be encoded as CData.

  2. The encode function takes in two additional parameters than JSONEncoder does. The first additional parameter in the function is a RootKey string that will have the entire XML wrapped in an element named that key. This parameter is required. The second parameter is an XMLHeader, which is an optional parameter that can take the version, encoding strategy and standalone status, if you want to include this information in the encoded xml.


Examples

For a full list of examples, see the Sample XML folder in the repository.

XML To Parse:

<?xml version="1.0"?><book id="bk101">    <author>Gambardella, Matthew</author>    <title>XML Developer's Guide</title>    <genre>Computer</genre>    <price>44.95</price>    <publish_date>2000-10-01</publish_date>    <description>An in-depth look at creating applications        with XML.</description></book>

Swift Structs:

struct Book: Codable {    var id: String    var author: String    var title: String    var genre: Genre    var price: Double    var publishDate: Date    var description: String        enum CodingKeys: String, CodingKey {        case id, author, title, genre, price, description                case publishDate = "publish_date"    }}enum Genre: String, Codable {    case computer = "Computer"    case fantasy = "Fantasy"    case romance = "Romance"    case horror = "Horror"    case sciFi = "Science Fiction"}

XMLDecoder:

let data = Data(forResource: "book", withExtension: "xml") else { return nil }        let decoder = XMLDecoder()        let formatter: DateFormatter = {   let formatter = DateFormatter()   formatter.dateFormat = "yyyy-MM-dd"   return formatter}()        decoder.dateDecodingStrategy = .formatted(formatter)        do {   let book = try decoder.decode(Book.self, from: data)} catch {   print(error)}

XMLEncoder:

let encoder = XMLEncoder()        let formatter: DateFormatter = {   let formatter = DateFormatter()   formatter.dateFormat = "yyyy-MM-dd"   return formatter}()        encoder.dateEncodingStrategy = .formatted(formatter)        do {   let data = try encoder.encode(self, withRootKey: "book", header: XMLHeader(version: 1.0))               print(String(data: data, encoding: .utf8))} catch {   print(error)}