XML Body Parser

Adds XML parsing to the body-parser library, so you can convert incoming XML data into a JSON representation.

This is really useful if you want to deal with plain old JavaScript objects, but you need to interface with XML APIs.


Installation

``
npm install express body-parser body-parser-xml
`

Usage

This library adds an xml method to the body-parser object.

Initialise like so:

`js
const bodyParser = require('body-parser');
require('body-parser-xml')(bodyParser);
`

Once initialised, you can use it just like any other body-parser middleware:

`js
const app = require('express')();
app.use(bodyParser.xml());
`

This will parse any XML-based request and place it as a JavaScript object on req.body for your route handlers to use.

An XML-based request is determined by the value of the Content-Type header. By default, any Content-Type header ending in /xml or +xml will be parsed as XML. For example, the following Content-Types will all match:

- text/xml
- application/xml
- application/rss+xml

If you need to match against a custom Content-Type header, pass in the type to match as an option (see below).

$3

You can also pass in options:

`js
app.use(bodyParser.xml(options));
`

The options object accepts any of the following keys:

#### defaultCharset

Specify the default character set for the text content if the charset is not specified in the Content-Type header of the request. Defaults to utf-8.

#### inflate

When set to true, then deflated (compressed) bodies will be inflated; when false, deflated bodies are rejected. Defaults to true.

#### limit

Controls the maximum request body size. If this is a number, then the value specifies the number of bytes; if it is a string, the value is passed to the bytes library for parsing. Defaults to '100kb'.

#### type

The type option is used to determine what media type the middleware will parse. This option can be a string, array of strings, or a function. If not a function, type option is passed directly to the type-is library and this can be an extension name (like xml), a mime type (like application/xml), or a mime type with a wildcard (like _/_ or _/xml). If a function, the type option is called as fn(req) and the request is parsed if it returns a truthy value. Defaults to ['_/xml', '+xml'].

#### verify

The verify option, if supplied, is called as verify(req, res, buf, encoding), where buf is a Buffer of the raw request body and encoding is the encoding of the request. The parsing can be aborted by throwing an error.

#### xmlParseOptions

This option controls the behaviour of the XML parser. You can pass any option that is supported by the xml2js library: see here for a list of these options.

Example

`js
const express = require('express');
const bodyParser = require('body-parser');

require('body-parser-xml')(bodyParser);

const app = express();
app.use(
bodyParser.xml({
limit: '1MB', // Reject payload bigger than 1 MB
xmlParseOptions: {
normalize: true, // Trim whitespace inside text nodes
normalizeTags: true, // Transform tags to lowercase
explicitArray: false, // Only put nodes in array if >1
},
}),
);

app.post('/users', function (req, res, body) {
// Any request with an XML payload will be parsed
// and a JavaScript object produced on req.body
// corresponding to the request payload.
console.log(req.body);
res.status(200).end();
});
`

Motivation

This library was born out of a frustration that express-xml-bodyparser, the most popular XML-parsing library for express, doesn't support the regular body-parser options - in particular, limiting the payload size.

This library was written to use body-parser's text parser under the hood, and then passes the parsed string into the XML parser. We can therefore take advantage of body-parser`'s regular options, and support limiting the payload size, amongst other things.

License

MIT