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org.w3c.dom

Interface Element

All Superinterfaces:
Node

public interface Element
implements Node

The Element interface represents an element in an HTML or XML document. Elements may have attributes associated with them; since the Element interface inherits from Node, the generic Node interface attribute attributes may be used to retrieve the set of all attributes for an element. There are methods on the Element interface to retrieve either an Attr object by name or an attribute value by name. In XML, where an attribute value may contain entity references, an Attr object should be retrieved to examine the possibly fairly complex sub-tree representing the attribute value. On the other hand, in HTML, where all attributes have simple string values, methods to directly access an attribute value can safely be used as a convenience.In DOM Level 2, the method normalize is inherited from the Node interface where it was moved.

See also the Document Object Model (DOM) Level 2 Core Specification.

Method Summary

java.lang.String

getAttribute(java.lang.String name)

Retrieves an attribute value by name.

Attr

getAttributeNode(java.lang.String name)

Retrieves an attribute node by name.

Attr

getAttributeNodeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Retrieves an Attr node by local name and namespace URI.

java.lang.String

getAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Retrieves an attribute value by local name and namespace URI.

NodeList

getElementsByTagName(java.lang.String name)

Returns a NodeList of all descendant Elements with a given tag name, in the order in which they are encountered in a preorder traversal of this Element tree.

NodeList

getElementsByTagNameNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Returns a NodeList of all the descendant Elements with a given local name and namespace URI in the order in which they are encountered in a preorder traversal of this Element tree.

java.lang.String

getTagName()

The name of the element.

boolean

hasAttribute(java.lang.String name)

Returns true when an attribute with a given name is specified on this element or has a default value, false otherwise.

boolean

hasAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Returns true when an attribute with a given local name and namespace URI is specified on this element or has a default value, false otherwise.

void

removeAttribute(java.lang.String name)

Removes an attribute by name.

Attr

removeAttributeNode(Attr oldAttr)

Removes the specified attribute node.

void

removeAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Removes an attribute by local name and namespace URI.

void

setAttribute(java.lang.String name, java.lang.String value)

Adds a new attribute.

Attr

setAttributeNode(Attr newAttr)

Adds a new attribute node.

Attr

setAttributeNodeNS(Attr newAttr)

Adds a new attribute.

void

setAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String qualifiedName, java.lang.String value)

Adds a new attribute.

Method Details

getAttribute

public String getAttribute(java.lang.String name)

Retrieves an attribute value by name.

Parameters:
name - The name of the attribute to retrieve.
Returns:
The Attr value as a string, or the empty string if that attribute does not have a specified or default value.

getAttributeNode

public Attr getAttributeNode(java.lang.String name)

Retrieves an attribute node by name.
To retrieve an attribute node by qualified name and namespace URI, use the getAttributeNodeNS method.

Parameters:
name - The name (nodeName) of the attribute to retrieve.
Returns:
The Attr node with the specified name ( nodeName) or null if there is no such attribute.

getAttributeNodeNS

public Attr getAttributeNodeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Retrieves an Attr node by local name and namespace URI.
Documents which do not support the "XML" feature will permit only the DOM Level 1 calls for creating/setting elements and attributes. Hence, if you specify a non-null namespace URI, these DOMs will never find a matching node.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
namespaceURI - The namespace URI of the attribute to retrieve.
localName - The local name of the attribute to retrieve.
Returns:
The Attr node with the specified attribute local name and namespace URI or null if there is no such attribute.

getAttributeNS

public String getAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Retrieves an attribute value by local name and namespace URI.
Documents which do not support the "XML" feature will permit only the DOM Level 1 calls for creating/setting elements and attributes. Hence, if you specify a non-null namespace URI, these DOMs will never find a matching node.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
namespaceURI - The namespace URI of the attribute to retrieve.
localName - The local name of the attribute to retrieve.
Returns:
The Attr value as a string, or the empty string if that attribute does not have a specified or default value.

getElementsByTagName

public NodeList getElementsByTagName(java.lang.String name)

Returns a NodeList of all descendant Elements with a given tag name, in the order in which they are encountered in a preorder traversal of this Element tree.

Parameters:
name - The name of the tag to match on.
Returns:
A list of matching Element nodes.

getElementsByTagNameNS

public NodeList getElementsByTagNameNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Returns a NodeList of all the descendant Elements with a given local name and namespace URI in the order in which they are encountered in a preorder traversal of this Element tree.
Documents which do not support the "XML" feature will permit only the DOM Level 1 calls for creating/setting elements and attributes. Hence, if you specify a non-null namespace URI, these DOMs will never find a matching node.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
namespaceURI - The namespace URI of the elements to match on.
localName - The local name of the elements to match on.
Returns:
A new NodeList object containing all the matched Elements.

getTagName

public String getTagName()

The name of the element. For example, in: 
 <elementExample 
 id="demo"> ... </elementExample
tagName has the value "elementExample". Note that this is case-preserving in XML, as are all of the operations of the DOM. The HTML DOM returns the tagName of an HTML element in the canonical uppercase form, regardless of the case in the source HTML document.

hasAttribute

public boolean hasAttribute(java.lang.String name)

Returns true when an attribute with a given name is specified on this element or has a default value, false otherwise.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
name - The name of the attribute to look for.
Returns:
true if an attribute with the given name is specified on this element or has a default value, false otherwise.

hasAttributeNS

public boolean hasAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Returns true when an attribute with a given local name and namespace URI is specified on this element or has a default value, false otherwise.
Documents which do not support the "XML" feature will permit only the DOM Level 1 calls for creating/setting elements and attributes. Hence, if you specify a non-null namespace URI, these DOMs will never find a matching node.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
namespaceURI - The namespace URI of the attribute to look for.
localName - The local name of the attribute to look for.
Returns:
true if an attribute with the given local name and namespace URI is specified or has a default value on this element, false otherwise.

removeAttribute

public void removeAttribute(java.lang.String name)

Removes an attribute by name. If the removed attribute is known to have a default value, an attribute immediately appears containing the default value as well as the corresponding namespace URI, local name, and prefix when applicable.
To remove an attribute by local name and namespace URI, use the removeAttributeNS method.

Parameters:
name - The name of the attribute to remove.
Throws:
DOMException - NO_MODIFICATION_ALLOWED_ERR: Raised if this node is readonly.

removeAttributeNode

public Attr removeAttributeNode(Attr oldAttr)

Removes the specified attribute node. If the removed Attr has a default value it is immediately replaced. The replacing attribute has the same namespace URI and local name, as well as the original prefix, when applicable.

Parameters:
oldAttr - The Attr node to remove from the attribute list.
Returns:
The Attr node that was removed.
Throws:
DOMException - NO_MODIFICATION_ALLOWED_ERR: Raised if this node is readonly.

removeAttributeNS

public void removeAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String localName)

Removes an attribute by local name and namespace URI. If the removed attribute has a default value it is immediately replaced. The replacing attribute has the same namespace URI and local name, as well as the original prefix.
Documents which do not support the "XML" feature will permit only the DOM Level 1 calls for creating/setting elements and attributes. Hence, if you specify a non-null namespace URI, these DOMs will never find a matching node.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
namespaceURI - The namespace URI of the attribute to remove.
localName - The local name of the attribute to remove.
Throws:
DOMException - NO_MODIFICATION_ALLOWED_ERR: Raised if this node is readonly.

setAttribute

public void setAttribute(java.lang.String name, java.lang.String value)

Adds a new attribute. If an attribute with that name is already present in the element, its value is changed to be that of the value parameter. This value is a simple string; it is not parsed as it is being set. So any markup (such as syntax to be recognized as an entity reference) is treated as literal text, and needs to be appropriately escaped by the implementation when it is written out. In order to assign an attribute value that contains entity references, the user must create an Attr node plus any Text and EntityReference nodes, build the appropriate subtree, and use setAttributeNode to assign it as the value of an attribute.
To set an attribute with a qualified name and namespace URI, use the setAttributeNS method.

Parameters:
name - The name of the attribute to create or alter.
value - Value to set in string form.
Throws:
DOMException - INVALID_CHARACTER_ERR: Raised if the specified name contains an illegal character.

setAttributeNode

public Attr setAttributeNode(Attr newAttr)

Adds a new attribute node. If an attribute with that name ( nodeName) is already present in the element, it is replaced by the new one.
To add a new attribute node with a qualified name and namespace URI, use the setAttributeNodeNS method.

Parameters:
newAttr - The Attr node to add to the attribute list.
Returns:
If the newAttr attribute replaces an existing attribute, the replaced Attr node is returned, otherwise null is returned.
Throws:
DOMException - WRONG_DOCUMENT_ERR: Raised if newAttr was created from a different document than the one that created the element.

setAttributeNodeNS

public Attr setAttributeNodeNS(Attr newAttr)

Adds a new attribute. If an attribute with that local name and that namespace URI is already present in the element, it is replaced by the new one.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
newAttr - The Attr node to add to the attribute list.
Returns:
If the newAttr attribute replaces an existing attribute with the same local name and namespace URI, the replaced Attr node is returned, otherwise null is returned.
Throws:
DOMException - WRONG_DOCUMENT_ERR: Raised if newAttr was created from a different document than the one that created the element.

setAttributeNS

public void setAttributeNS(java.lang.String namespaceURI, java.lang.String qualifiedName, java.lang.String value)

Adds a new attribute. If an attribute with the same local name and namespace URI is already present on the element, its prefix is changed to be the prefix part of the qualifiedName, and its value is changed to be the value parameter. This value is a simple string; it is not parsed as it is being set. So any markup (such as syntax to be recognized as an entity reference) is treated as literal text, and needs to be appropriately escaped by the implementation when it is written out. In order to assign an attribute value that contains entity references, the user must create an Attr node plus any Text and EntityReference nodes, build the appropriate subtree, and use setAttributeNodeNS or setAttributeNode to assign it as the value of an attribute.

Since:
DOM Level 2
Parameters:
namespaceURI - The namespace URI of the attribute to create or alter.
qualifiedName - The qualified name of the attribute to create or alter.
value - The value to set in string form.
Throws:
DOMException - INVALID_CHARACTER_ERR: Raised if the specified qualified name contains an illegal character, per the XML 1.0 specification .
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