I'm parsing XML with the XML::Parser module.

The thing works fine, except when it encounters an ampersand in non-markup data (anything that's not a tag):

<writeup node_id="980117" reputation="0" createtime="2001-03-12 17:27:
+54">M&M McFlurry (thing)</writeup>

[download]

According to XML::Parser, this is not well-formed XML data, because of the & in M&M.

Is there any way I can get around this? Perhaps change ampersands to their HTML entity equivalent (&amp;) in my character event handler?

Here's my code:

sub parseUserSearchXML {
    my $XMLParser = new XML::Parser(Handlers => {Start => \&startHandl
+er, End => \&endHandler, Char => \&charHandler});
    my $node;
    
    $XMLParser->parsefile($filename);
}

# event handler for XML::Parser - start tag event
sub startHandler {
    my ($expat, $tag, %attributes) = @_;
    $buffer = '';
    unless($tag =~ /$tags_to_ignore/o) {
        %temp = %attributes;
    }
}

# event handler for XML::Parser - non-markup event
sub charHandler {
    my ($expat, $string) = @_;
    $buffer .= $string;
}

# event handler for XML::Parser - end tag event
sub endHandler {
    my ($expat, $tag) = @_;
    unless($tag =~ /$tags_to_ignore/o) {                            
        $buffer =~ s/ \($crap_to_remove\)$//o;                    # st
+rip (person) (place) (thing) or (idea)
        $nodes{$buffer} = {%temp};
    }
    $buffer = '';
}

[download]

---
donfreenut

In reply to An ampersand is not well-formed XML data? by donfreenut

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