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<title>Runs XPath query on XML data</title>
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<h1 class="refname">SimpleXMLElement::xpath</h1>
<p class="verinfo">(PHP 5 >= 5.2.0)</p><p class="refpurpose"><span class="refname">SimpleXMLElement::xpath</span> — <span class="dc-title">Runs XPath query on XML data</span></p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 description" id="refsect1-simplexmlelement.xpath-description">
<h3 class="title">Description</h3>
<div class="methodsynopsis dc-description">
<span class="modifier">public</span> <span class="type">array</span> <span class="methodname"><strong>SimpleXMLElement::xpath</strong></span>
( <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">string</span> <code class="parameter">$path</code></span>
)</div>
<p class="para rdfs-comment">
The <em>xpath</em> method searches the SimpleXML node for
children matching the <acronym title="XML Path Language">XPath</acronym> <em><code class="parameter">path</code></em>.
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 parameters" id="refsect1-simplexmlelement.xpath-parameters">
<h3 class="title">Parameters</h3>
<p class="para">
<dl>
<dt>
<span class="term"><em><code class="parameter">path</code></em></span>
<dd>
<p class="para">
An XPath path
</p>
</dd>
</dt>
</dl>
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 returnvalues" id="refsect1-simplexmlelement.xpath-returnvalues">
<h3 class="title">Return Values</h3>
<p class="para">
Returns an <span class="type"><a href="language.types.array.html" class="type array">array</a></span> of SimpleXMLElement objects or <strong><code>FALSE</code></strong> in
case of an error.
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 examples" id="refsect1-simplexmlelement.xpath-examples">
<h3 class="title">Examples</h3>
<p class="para">
<div class="example" id="example-5512">
<p><strong>Example #1 Xpath</strong></p>
<div class="example-contents">
<div class="phpcode"><code><span style="color: #000000">
<span style="color: #0000BB"><?php<br />$string </span><span style="color: #007700">= <<<XML<br /></span><span style="color: #DD0000"><a><br /> <b><br /> <c>text</c><br /> <c>stuff</c><br /> </b><br /> <d><br /> <c>code</c><br /> </d><br /></a><br /></span><span style="color: #007700">XML;<br /><br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$xml </span><span style="color: #007700">= new </span><span style="color: #0000BB">SimpleXMLElement</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$string</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br /><br /></span><span style="color: #FF8000">/* Search for <a><b><c> */<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$result </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$xml</span><span style="color: #007700">-></span><span style="color: #0000BB">xpath</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'/a/b/c'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br /><br />while(list( , </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$node</span><span style="color: #007700">) = </span><span style="color: #0000BB">each</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$result</span><span style="color: #007700">)) {<br /> echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'/a/b/c: '</span><span style="color: #007700">,</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$node</span><span style="color: #007700">,</span><span style="color: #DD0000">"\n"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br />}<br /><br /></span><span style="color: #FF8000">/* Relative paths also work... */<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$result </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$xml</span><span style="color: #007700">-></span><span style="color: #0000BB">xpath</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'b/c'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br /><br />while(list( , </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$node</span><span style="color: #007700">) = </span><span style="color: #0000BB">each</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$result</span><span style="color: #007700">)) {<br /> echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'b/c: '</span><span style="color: #007700">,</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$node</span><span style="color: #007700">,</span><span style="color: #DD0000">"\n"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br />}<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">?></span>
</span>
</code></div>
</div>
<div class="example-contents"><p>The above example will output:</p></div>
<div class="example-contents screen">
<div class="cdata"><pre>
/a/b/c: text
/a/b/c: stuff
b/c: text
b/c: stuff
</pre></div>
</div>
<div class="example-contents"><p>
Notice that the two results are equal.
</p></div>
</div>
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 seealso" id="refsect1-simplexmlelement.xpath-seealso">
<h3 class="title">See Also</h3>
<p class="para">
<ul class="simplelist">
<li class="member"> <span class="methodname"><a href="simplexmlelement.registerxpathnamespace.html" class="methodname" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">SimpleXMLElement::registerXPathNamespace()</a> - Creates a prefix/ns context for the next XPath query</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="methodname"><a href="simplexmlelement.getdocnamespaces.html" class="methodname" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">SimpleXMLElement::getDocNamespaces()</a> - Returns namespaces declared in document</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="methodname"><a href="simplexmlelement.getnamespaces.html" class="methodname" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">SimpleXMLElement::getNamespaces()</a> - Returns namespaces used in document</span></li>
<li class="member"><a href="simplexml.examples-basic.html" class="xref">Basic SimpleXML usage</a></li>
</ul>
</p>
</div>
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