Hammy has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hello, I have been given a heck of a lot of good information and documentation for my SOAP problems to date so thank you. I have very strange behavior when converting a string to soap and I am hoping someone has seen this before. The code is simple: 
$xml = '<wellmed>MessageList><MessageItem msgtype="5" subject="Bookmar
+k from Health Coach"><Patient loginname="' ."$ss|$name|$dob" . '" spo
+nsorid="303" /><DocumentList><DocumentItem date="' . "$theDate" .'" f
+rom="HealthDialog" time="">abc</DocumentItem></DocumentList></Message
+Item></MessageList></wellmed>';

use XML::Simple;
use SOAP::Lite +trace; 

my $data = SOAP::Data->name('data' => "$xml")->type('string')->uri('')
+;

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I would expect all '<' characters to be turned to '& l t ;' and all '>' characters to be turned to '& g t ;' (I put in the spaces here because it converts them for display). It converts the '<', but not the '>'. I can not fathom why it converts one type and not the other. Here is the trace: 
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><SOAP-ENV:Envelope xmlns:SOAP-EN
+C="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/" SOAP-ENV:encodingStyle=
+"http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/" xmlns:SOAP-ENV="http://sc
+hemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/1999/X
+MLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/1999/XMLSchema"><SOAP
+-ENV:Body><namesp1:PerformUpdate xmlns:namesp1="http://di.wellmed.com
+/SoapService"><data xmlns="" xsi:type="xsd:string">&lt;wellmed>Messag
+eList>&lt;MessageItem msgtype="5" subject="Bookmark from Health Coach
+">&lt;Patient loginname="111111111|LYNN|19407202" sponsorid="303" />&
+lt;DocumentList>&lt;DocumentItem date="09/17/04" from="HealthDialog" 
+time="">abc&lt;/DocumentItem>&lt;/DocumentList>&lt;/MessageItem>&lt;/
+MessageList>&lt;/wellmed></data></namesp1:PerformUpdate></SOAP-ENV:Bo
+dy></SOAP-ENV:Envelope>

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Thank You

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: SOAP string conversion problem
by bpphillips (Friar) on Sep 20, 2004 at 18:38 UTC
    From the SOAP/Lite.pm file (line #349 in my version): 
    # Q: why only '&' and '<' are encoded, but not '>'?
# A: because it is not required according to XML spec.
#
# [http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml#syntax]
# The ampersand character (&) and the left angle bracket (<) may appea
+r in
# their literal form only when used as markup delimiters, or within a 
+comment,
# a processing instruction, or a CDATA section. If they are needed els
+ewhere,
# they must be escaped using either numeric character references or th
+e
# strings "&amp;" and "&lt;" respectively. The right angle bracket (>)
+ may be
# represented using the string "&gt;", and must, for compatibility, be
+ # escaped using "&gt;" or a character reference when it appears in t
+he
# string "]]>" in content, when that string is not marking the end of 
+a
# CDATA section.

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[reply]
[d/l]
      Thanks you very much that answers my question - The service is having a problem retrieving this info with the '>' not being encoded, but it appears (as it usually does) that Perl is doing what it should. Thank you again for your help!
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Re: SOAP string conversion problem
by ikegami (Patriarch) on Sep 20, 2004 at 17:51 UTC

    Parsers will ignore closing tags if they haven't seen an opening tag. I don't know if taking the shortcut you mention is legal, but it will probably work fine.

    btw, the proper way to write &lt; in HTML is &amp;lt;, as opposed to & l t ;.

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[d/l]
[select]
      Thanks for getting back to me so quickly. I am not sure what shortcut I took. As for ignoring closing tags - the opening tags are there, the parser just converts them. How do I get it to recognize and convert both tags?
[reply]

        I was trying to say the > don't need to be escaped because &lt;...> will not be confused as <...>. The library takes the shortcut of not escaping >s to save time and to reduce the size of the output.

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