Webmaster Forum / ColdFusion / Advanced Techniques / January 2008

I have nodes in my XML file that look like this:
<?xml...
 <Listings xmlns...
   <Listing>
    <name>John Doe</name>
    <address format="simple">
      <component name="addr1">155 Main Street</component>
      <component name="city">New York</component>
      <component name="province">NY</component>
      <component name="postal_code">99999</component>
    </address>
    <phone type="main">(555) 555-5555</phone>
    <phone type="fax">(444) 444-4444</phone>
   </Listing>
 </Listings>

The problem is, what if all 4 address lines aren't there, and what if they
don't send the Fax or any phone number.  With simpler XML elements, I'm able to
do stuff like this and it works:

<cfif NOT structKeyExists(mydoc.listings.listing[i], "name")>
    <cfoutput>Record #i#: Name doesn't exist!</cfoutput><br>
    <cfset mydoc.listings.listing[i].name = XmlElemNew(mydoc,"name")>
    <cfset mydoc.listings.listing[i].name.XmlText = "Unknown">
</cfif>

If "name" isn't in the file, it sets it to "Unknown".

But I can't get this code to work for the more complicated structures like
address and phone above.  If I do something like the following, it says the
phone isn't present, even though it is:

<cfif NOT structKeyExists(mydoc.listings.listing[i],"phone[1]")>
    <cfoutput>Record #i#: Phone_main doesn't exist!</cfoutput><br>
    <cfset mydoc.listings.listing[i].phone[1].xxx = XmlElemNew(mydoc,"xxx")>
    <cfset mydoc.listings.listing[i].phone[1].xxx.XmlText = "0">
</cfif>

Basically the problem is, if I don't insert a node, then Coldfusion throws an
exception when I try to put it in a query:

<cfset temp = QuerySetCell(storequery, "phone_main",
        #mydoc.listings.listing[i].phone[1].XmlText#, #i#)>

Maybe there's a better work-around for the problem than inserting nodes for
missing nodes?

Any help with this would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Mike