Naive attempt at fixing #306 #754

duoduobingbing · 2025-04-27T15:27:17Z

This PR aims to fix #306 naively by just changing the default property name of XmlText from "" to <xml:text>. The new value was chosen, because it is an invalid property and element name in XML and thus should hopefully not collide with existing setups.

I was not sure if XmlText having the property name "" is considered an implementation detail. If it is not an implementation detail this is most likely to be considered as a breaking change.

Feel free to close this PR if e.g. something else is planned to fix #306 or if XmlText has to keep the property name empty string because of compatibility reasons.

cowtowncoder · 2025-04-28T00:54:30Z

Choice of "" to represent XmlText is not a simple implementation detail so I doubt we can change that for Jackson 2.x, unfortunately due to (like you correctly guessed) compatibility concerns.

But I think we might be able to do just that for 3.x, being major version change.

I haven't looked into PR yet (just description) to comment on changes, but wanted to point out that change as described likely can't be made in 2.x branch.

src/main/java/com/fasterxml/jackson/dataformat/xml/deser/XmlTextPropertyNameHolder.java

cowtowncoder · 2025-04-28T01:27:14Z

Ok so I do like the idea -- just need to re-create for 3.0.0 (branch 3.x).

…text>`

duoduobingbing · 2025-04-28T19:04:58Z

Ok so I do like the idea -- just need to re-create for 3.0.0 (branch 3.x).

Thanks for looking into this so swiftly.

I did rebase onto 3.x and just used FromXmlParser.DEFAULT_TEXT_PROPERTY and removed the newly introduced XmlTextPropertyNameHolder.PROPERTY_NAME completely.

cowtowncoder · 2025-05-01T16:49:15Z

src/main/java/tools/jackson/dataformat/xml/JacksonXmlAnnotationIntrospector.java

@@ -208,6 +209,10 @@ public PropertyName findNameForDeserialization(MapperConfig<?> config, Annotated
        PropertyName pn = PropertyName.merge(_findXmlName(a),
                super.findNameForDeserialization(config, a));
        if (pn == null) {
+            if(_hasAnnotation(a, JacksonXmlText.class)){
+                return PropertyName.construct(FromXmlParser.DEFAULT_TEXT_PROPERTY);


Quick notes: not just _hasAnnotation -- JacksonXmlText.value() must be true (specifying false can be used to disable annotation's effect).

But I have related concern: there now won't be a way to override name of logical property to use as it's effectively hard-coded. Should there be a way to re-configure that? And if so, how?
(MapperConfig passed won't have access to XML-specific config mapper has. But maybe this introspector should have its own config or something.

For the first note: This has been fixed in the latest commit of this pull request

For the second note: I've added a config on the introspector so that this can be configured.

src/main/java/tools/jackson/dataformat/xml/deser/FromXmlParser.java

cowtowncoder · 2025-05-13T02:20:35Z

Ok. I am not quite sure what the added configurability does, to be honest. I know I asked for it, but the combination of name and "infer" flag is bit unclear to me.

I realized that FromXmlParser already allows specifying different underlying name to use like so

FromXmlFactory f = FromXmlFactory.builder()
    .nameForTextElement("text-marker-element")
    .build();

So, f.ex input like:

<root attr="123">456</root>

would in 3.0 be exposed as:

{
  "root": {
    "attr": "123",
    "<xml:text>": "456"
  }
}

with default settings.

Given this, I wonder if annotation-level configurability is really needed? If it is, how does it control things?

cowtowncoder · 2025-05-13T02:38:02Z

src/main/java/tools/jackson/dataformat/xml/deser/XmlDeserializationContext.java

@@ -68,7 +68,7 @@ public String extractScalarFromObject(JsonParser p, ValueDeserializer<?> deser,
            final String propName = p.currentName();
            JsonToken t = p.nextToken();
            if (t == JsonToken.VALUE_STRING) {
-                if (propName.equals("")) {
+                if (FromXmlParser.DEFAULT_TEXT_PROPERTY.equals(propName)) {


I think this needs to actually consider FromXmlParser._cfgNameForTextElement, since that may be configured different from default. Comment above hints at that.

Will change to do that.

cowtowncoder · 2025-05-13T02:43:41Z

src/main/java/tools/jackson/dataformat/xml/JacksonXmlAnnotationIntrospector.java

+                !_cfgIntrospectorConfig.inferXmlTextPropertyName()) {
+                return _cfgIntrospectorConfig.xmlTextPropertyName();
+            }
+
            if (_hasOneOf(a, ANNOTATIONS_TO_INFER_XML_PROP)) {


This will look for @JacksonXmlText OR @JacksonXmlElementWrapper and handling will now differ -- former should use configured "text element name", latter should not (should return "use default").

I do not quite understand, the highlighted line only looks for @JacksonXmlText

Sorry, I meant line 225 right after (if (_hasOneOf(...)).

cowtowncoder · 2025-05-13T03:14:34Z

src/test/java/tools/jackson/dataformat/xml/node/JsonNodeBasicDeserTest.java

@@ -43,7 +44,7 @@ public void testMixedContent() throws Exception
    {
        JsonNode fromXml = XML_MAPPER.readTree("<root>first<a>123</a>second<b>abc</b>last</root>");
        final ObjectNode exp = XML_MAPPER.createObjectNode();
-        exp.putArray("")
+        exp.putArray(FromXmlParser.DEFAULT_TEXT_PROPERTY)


Ohhhhhhh. This is NOT good -- what used to be something like:

{ "":["first","second","last"], "a":"123", "b":"abc" }

now looks like:

{ "<xml:text>":["first","second","last"], "a":"123", "b":"abc" }

which I don't think is what anyone likes to see :-(

So for JsonNode at least exposing XML character data sections should be with nominal key of "".
And I don't think it is reasonable to expected those using XmlMapper.readTree() to have explicitly configure things to work this way.

We need to figure out another way to handle the issue, I think.

We need to figure out another way to handle the issue, I think.

I mean this PR was just a naive shot at solving #306 by changing the property name, if it has to be "" I'm fine with closing this PR - because I do not know how to make it so, that the property name differs from the nominal key.

Right. I'll leave this open because I'd really like to figure out a way and feel there probably is a way (despite not seeing it yet). :)

I appreciate your attempt; sorry it took me a while to sync up to what changes really mean.

cowtowncoder · 2025-05-13T03:16:57Z

src/test/java/tools/jackson/dataformat/xml/node/JsonNodeMixedContent403Test.java

@@ -19,23 +20,23 @@ public class JsonNodeMixedContent403Test extends XmlTestUtil
    public void testMixedContentBefore() throws Exception
    {
        // First, before elements:
-        assertEquals(JSON_MAPPER.readTree(a2q("{'':'before','a':'1','b':'2'}")),
+        assertEquals(JSON_MAPPER.readTree(a2q(String.format("{'%s':'before','a':'1','b':'2'}", FromXmlParser.DEFAULT_TEXT_PROPERTY))),


and same here obviously.

cowtowncoder reviewed Apr 28, 2025

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duoduobingbing changed the base branch from 2.x to 3.x April 28, 2025 17:46

change default property name for xml text from empty string to `<xml:…

c53bc27

…text>`

duoduobingbing force-pushed the feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext branch from 24b57f1 to c53bc27 Compare April 28, 2025 19:00

duoduobingbing requested a review from cowtowncoder April 30, 2025 10:15

Merge branch '3.x' into feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext

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duoduobingbing requested a review from cowtowncoder May 6, 2025 13:02

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Merge branch '3.x' into feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext

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cowtowncoder added 5 commits May 12, 2025 18:29

Minor rephrasing of Javadocs

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ws clean up

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Merge branch '3.x' into feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext

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Merge branch '3.x' into feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext

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Merge branch '3.x' into feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext

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duoduobingbing closed this May 14, 2025

duoduobingbing deleted the feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext branch May 14, 2025 06:50

duoduobingbing restored the feature/record-with-jacksonxmltext branch May 14, 2025 06:51

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Naive attempt at fixing #306 #754

Naive attempt at fixing #306 #754

duoduobingbing commented Apr 27, 2025

cowtowncoder commented Apr 28, 2025

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Naive attempt at fixing #306 #754

Naive attempt at fixing #306 #754

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duoduobingbing commented Apr 27, 2025

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