Simple and fast XML parser

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Recently I was working on a project that required me to send an HTTPRequest, however, the API returned an XML instead of the now commonly used JSON. Because Roblox doesn’t (yet) have a built in XML parser, I decided to look for APIs, but I could only find one that is actually working, but it is limited, and I don’t want to pay for it just for others to use it. Because of this, I made an XML parser module.

Setup:

  • Get the module from here.
  • Place it into any script that needs to parse XML, or anywhere which can be accessible from such script.

Usage:

  • In your script, require the module
    local xmlParser = require(script.XMLParser)
  • Call the function and assign it to a variable
    local parsedXML = xmlParser.parseXML(xml)

Example:

local xml = 
	[[
	<store>
		<fruit>
			<name>Apple</name>
			<color>Red</color>
			<variety>
				<type>Fuji</type>
				<origin>Japan</origin>
			</variety>
			<variety>
				<type>Granny Smith</type>
				<origin>Australia</origin>
			</variety>
		</fruit>
		<fruit>
			<name>Banana</name>
			<color>Yellow</color>
		</fruit>
		</store>
	]]

local xmlParser = require(script.XMLParser)
local parsedXML = xmlParser.parseXML(xml)
print(parsedXML)

Output:

{
        ["store"] = {
                ["fruit"] = {
                        [1] = {
                                ["color"] = "Red",
                                ["name"] = "Apple",
                                ["variety"] = {
                                        [1] = {
                                                ["origin"] = "Japan",
                                                ["type"] = "Fuji"
                                        },
                                        [2] = {
                                                ["origin"] = "Australia",
                                                ["type"] = "Granny Smith"
                                        }
                                }
                        },
                        [2] = {
                                ["color"] = "Yellow",
                                ["name"] = "Banana"
                        }
                }
        }
}

Some notes:

  • All tags are in alphabetical order (but this doesn’t affect retrieving data from the array
  • In case of multiple tags with the same name, they get merged under one tag, but with a separate table for each original tag
  • Content that is not a tag but formatted similarly to XML (e. g. HTML, RichText) might be added to the array as a new tag (and there is not really a workaround, but if you know any, please tell me)
  • To retrieve data, simply do
    local fruits = parsedXML.store.fruit
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