Question

i am curious to know how can i get the database data in xml format in Zend framework using context switching.

Do i need to compulsorily specify the format in my url, like:

http://localhost/pt/public/index.php/api/v1/users.xml?param1=3

I want to get the format from url (.xml, .json…) and apply the corresponding format to my output automatically.

Currently iam doing this: I get the user data from the database. I get the users marks based on the class id i pass to the url:

$id = $request->getParam('param1'); // get class id param
$users = new Application_Model_DbTable_Users(); 
$result = $users->fetchData($id);

if(count($result) != 0)
        {
            $doc = new DOMDocument();
            $doc->formatOutput = true;
            $root = $doc->createElement("Student");
            $doc->appendChild($root);



            foreach($result as $details)
            {
             $root_element = $doc->createElement("Marks");
             $root->appendChild($root_element);

             $TElement = $doc->createElement("Total");
             $TElement->appendChild($doc->createTextNode($details->marks));
             $root_element->appendChild($TElement);
                        }

                        $xml =  $doc->saveXML();
            $this->view->xml  = $xml;
                       }     

And in the corresponding view script, i have this code:

<?php 
header('Content-type: text/xml');
echo $this->xml;
?>

I get the user data and use DOMDocument to write the xml output to the view. But is it possible to automatically generate the XML data from database, without using DOM ?

Answer 1

emaillenin is right, there’s nothing ZF can do to convert your data to XML.

But instead of forming XML manually (with DOMDocument and the like), I suggest that you take a look at PEAR XML_Serializer package.

XML_Serializer allows you to transform arrays, objects, etc. to well-formed XML. You can also specify your root name, default tag names, indentation type, etc. So, you’re pretty much in control for the resulting XML.