public interface Node
Node interface is the primary datatype for the entire Document Object Model. It represents a single node in the document tree. While all objects implementing the
Node interface expose methods for dealing with children, not all objects implementing the
Node interface may have children. For example,
Text nodes may not have children, and adding children to such nodes results in a
DOMException being raised.
The attributes nodeName, nodeValue and attributes are included as a mechanism to get at node information without casting down to the specific derived interface. In cases where there is no obvious mapping of these attributes for a specific nodeType (e.g., nodeValue for an Element or attributes for a Comment ), this returns null. Note that the specialized interfaces may contain additional and more convenient mechanisms to get and set the relevant information.
The values of nodeName, nodeValue, and attributes vary according to the node type as follows:
| Interface | nodeName | nodeValue | attributes |
|---|---|---|---|
Attr |
same as Attr.name |
same as Attr.value |
null |
CDATASection |
"#cdata-section" |
same as CharacterData.data, the content of the CDATA Section |
null |
Comment |
"#comment" |
same as CharacterData.data, the content of the comment |
null |
Document |
"#document" |
null |
null |
DocumentFragment |
"#document-fragment" |
null |
null |
DocumentType |
same as DocumentType.name |
null |
null |
Element |
same as Element.tagName |
null |
NamedNodeMap |
Entity |
entity name | null |
null |
EntityReference |
name of entity referenced | null |
null |
Notation |
notation name | null |
null |
ProcessingInstruction |
same as ProcessingInstruction.target |
same as ProcessingInstruction.data |
null |
Text |
"#text" |
same as CharacterData.data, the content of the text node |
null |
See also the Document Object Model (DOM) Level 3 Core Specification.
| Modifier and Type | Field and Description |
|---|---|
static short |
ATTRIBUTE_NODE
The node is an
Attr.
|
static short |
CDATA_SECTION_NODE
The node is a
CDATASection.
|
static short |
COMMENT_NODE
The node is a
Comment.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_FRAGMENT_NODE
The node is a
DocumentFragment.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_NODE
The node is a
Document.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_POSITION_CONTAINED_BY
The node is contained by the reference node.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_POSITION_CONTAINS
The node contains the reference node.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_POSITION_DISCONNECTED
The two nodes are disconnected.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_POSITION_FOLLOWING
The node follows the reference node.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_POSITION_IMPLEMENTATION_SPECIFIC
The determination of preceding versus following is implementation-specific.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_POSITION_PRECEDING
The second node precedes the reference node.
|
static short |
DOCUMENT_TYPE_NODE
The node is a
DocumentType.
|
static short |
ELEMENT_NODE
The node is an
Element.
|
static short |
ENTITY_NODE
The node is an
Entity.
|
static short |
ENTITY_REFERENCE_NODE
The node is an
EntityReference.
|
static short |
NOTATION_NODE
The node is a
Notation.
|
static short |
PROCESSING_INSTRUCTION_NODE
The node is a
ProcessingInstruction.
|
static short |
TEXT_NODE
The node is a
Text node.
|
| Modifier and Type | Method and Description |
|---|---|
Node |
appendChild(Node
Adds the node
newChild to the end of the list of children of this node.
|
Node |
cloneNode(boolean deep)
Returns a duplicate of this node, i.e., serves as a generic copy constructor for nodes.
|
short |
compareDocumentPosition(Node
Compares the reference node, i.e.
|
NamedNodeMap |
getAttributes()
A
NamedNodeMap containing the attributes of this node (if it is an
Element) or
null otherwise.
|
String |
getBaseURI()
The absolute base URI of this node or
null if the implementation wasn't able to obtain an absolute URI.
|
NodeList |
getChildNodes()
A
NodeList that contains all children of this node.
|
Object |
getFeature(String
This method returns a specialized object which implements the specialized APIs of the specified feature and version, as specified in .
|
Node |
getFirstChild()
The first child of this node.
|
Node |
getLastChild()
The last child of this node.
|
String |
getLocalName()
Returns the local part of the qualified name of this node.
|
String |
getNamespaceURI()
The namespace URI of this node, or
null if it is unspecified (see ).
|
Node |
getNextSibling()
The node immediately following this node.
|
String |
getNodeName()
The name of this node, depending on its type; see the table above.
|
short |
getNodeType()
A code representing the type of the underlying object, as defined above.
|
String |
getNodeValue()
The value of this node, depending on its type; see the table above.
|
Document |
getOwnerDocument()
The
Document object associated with this node.
|
Node |
getParentNode()
The parent of this node.
|
String |
getPrefix()
The namespace prefix of this node, or
null if it is unspecified.
|
Node |
getPreviousSibling()
The node immediately preceding this node.
|
String |
getTextContent()
This attribute returns the text content of this node and its descendants.
|
Object |
getUserData(String
Retrieves the object associated to a key on a this node.
|
boolean |
hasAttributes()
Returns whether this node (if it is an element) has any attributes.
|
boolean |
hasChildNodes()
Returns whether this node has any children.
|
Node |
insertBefore(Node
Inserts the node
newChild before the existing child node
refChild.
|
boolean |
isDefaultNamespace(String
This method checks if the specified
namespaceURI is the default namespace or not.
|
boolean |
isEqualNode(Node
Tests whether two nodes are equal.
|
boolean |
isSameNode(Node
Returns whether this node is the same node as the given one.
|
boolean |
isSupported(String
Tests whether the DOM implementation implements a specific feature and that feature is supported by this node, as specified in .
|
String |
lookupNamespaceURI(String
Look up the namespace URI associated to the given prefix, starting from this node.
|
String |
lookupPrefix(String
Look up the prefix associated to the given namespace URI, starting from this node.
|
void |
normalize()
Puts all
Text nodes in the full depth of the sub-tree underneath this
Node, including attribute nodes, into a "normal" form where only structure (e.g., elements, comments, processing instructions, CDATA sections, and entity references) separates
Text nodes, i.e., there are neither adjacent
Text nodes nor empty
Text nodes.
|
Node |
removeChild(Node
Removes the child node indicated by
oldChild from the list of children, and returns it.
|
Node |
replaceChild(Node
Replaces the child node
oldChild with
newChild in the list of children, and returns the
oldChild node.
|
void |
setNodeValue(String
The value of this node, depending on its type; see the table above.
|
void |
setPrefix(String
The namespace prefix of this node, or
null if it is unspecified.
|
void |
setTextContent(String
This attribute returns the text content of this node and its descendants.
|
Object |
setUserData(String
Associate an object to a key on this node.
|
static final short ELEMENT_NODE
Element.
static final short ATTRIBUTE_NODE
Attr.
static final short TEXT_NODE
Text node.
static final short CDATA_SECTION_NODE
CDATASection.
static final short ENTITY_REFERENCE_NODE
EntityReference.
static final short ENTITY_NODE
Entity.
static final short PROCESSING_INSTRUCTION_NODE
ProcessingInstruction.
static final short COMMENT_NODE
Comment.
static final short DOCUMENT_NODE
Document.
static final short DOCUMENT_TYPE_NODE
DocumentType.
static final short DOCUMENT_FRAGMENT_NODE
DocumentFragment.
static final short NOTATION_NODE
Notation.
static final short DOCUMENT_POSITION_DISCONNECTED
static final short DOCUMENT_POSITION_PRECEDING
static final short DOCUMENT_POSITION_FOLLOWING
static final short DOCUMENT_POSITION_CONTAINS
static final short DOCUMENT_POSITION_CONTAINED_BY
static final short DOCUMENT_POSITION_IMPLEMENTATION_SPECIFIC
StringgetNodeName()
StringgetNodeValue() throws DOMException
null, setting it has no effect, including if the node is read-only.
DOMException - DOMSTRING_SIZE_ERR: Raised when it would return more characters than fit in a
DOMString variable on the implementation platform.
void setNodeValue(StringnodeValue) throws DOMException
null, setting it has no effect, including if the node is read-only.
DOMException - NO_MODIFICATION_ALLOWED_ERR: Raised when the node is readonly and if it is not defined to be
null.
short getNodeType()
NodegetParentNode()
Attr,
Document,
DocumentFragment,
Entity, and
Notation may have a parent. However, if a node has just been created and not yet added to the tree, or if it has been removed from the tree, this is
null.
NodeListgetChildNodes()
NodeList that contains all children of this node. If there are no children, this is a
NodeList containing no nodes.
NodegetFirstChild()
null.
NodegetLastChild()
null.
NodegetPreviousSibling()
null.
NodegetNextSibling()
null.
NamedNodeMapgetAttributes()
NamedNodeMap containing the attributes of this node (if it is an
Element) or
null otherwise.
DocumentgetOwnerDocument()
Document object associated with this node. This is also the
Document object used to create new nodes. When this node is a
Document or a
DocumentType which is not used with any
Document yet, this is
null.
NodeinsertBefore(Node newChild, Node refChild) throws DOMException
newChild before the existing child node
refChild. If
refChild is
null, insert
newChild at the end of the list of children.
newChild is a
DocumentFragment object, all of its children are inserted, in the same order, before
refChild. If the
newChild is already in the tree, it is first removed.
Note: Inserting a node before itself is implementation dependent.
newChild - The node to insert.
refChild - The reference node, i.e., the node before which the new node must be inserted.
DOMException - HIERARCHY_REQUEST_ERR: Raised if this node is of a type that does not allow children of the type of the
newChild node, or if the node to insert is one of this node's ancestors or this node itself, or if this node is of type
Document and the DOM application attempts to insert a second
DocumentType or
Element node.
newChild was created from a different document than the one that created this node.
refChild is not a child of this node.
Document, this exception might be raised if the DOM implementation doesn't support the insertion of a
DocumentType or
Element node.
NodereplaceChild(Node newChild, Node oldChild) throws DOMException
oldChild with
newChild in the list of children, and returns the
oldChild node.
newChild is a
DocumentFragment object,
oldChild is replaced by all of the
DocumentFragment children, which are inserted in the same order. If the
newChild is already in the tree, it is first removed.
Note: Replacing a node with itself is implementation dependent.
newChild - The new node to put in the child list.
oldChild - The node being replaced in the list.
DOMException - HIERARCHY_REQUEST_ERR: Raised if this node is of a type that does not allow children of the type of the
newChild node, or if the node to put in is one of this node's ancestors or this node itself, or if this node is of type
Document and the result of the replacement operation would add a second
DocumentType or
Element on the
Document node.
newChild was created from a different document than the one that created this node.
oldChild is not a child of this node.
Document, this exception might be raised if the DOM implementation doesn't support the replacement of the
DocumentType child or
Element child.
NoderemoveChild(Node oldChild) throws DOMException
oldChild from the list of children, and returns it.
oldChild - The node being removed.
DOMException - NO_MODIFICATION_ALLOWED_ERR: Raised if this node is readonly.
oldChild is not a child of this node.
Document, this exception might be raised if the DOM implementation doesn't support the removal of the
DocumentType child or the
Element child.
NodeappendChild(Node newChild) throws DOMException
newChild to the end of the list of children of this node. If the
newChild is already in the tree, it is first removed.
newChild - The node to add.If it is a
DocumentFragment object, the entire contents of the document fragment are moved into the child list of this node
DOMException - HIERARCHY_REQUEST_ERR: Raised if this node is of a type that does not allow children of the type of the
newChild node, or if the node to append is one of this node's ancestors or this node itself, or if this node is of type
Document and the DOM application attempts to append a second
DocumentType or
Element node.
newChild was created from a different document than the one that created this node.
newChild node is a child of the
Document node, this exception might be raised if the DOM implementation doesn't support the removal of the
DocumentType child or
Element child.
boolean hasChildNodes()
true if this node has any children,
false otherwise.
NodecloneNode(boolean deep)
parentNode is
null) and no user data. User data associated to the imported node is not carried over. However, if any
UserDataHandlers has been specified along with the associated data these handlers will be called with the appropriate parameters before this method returns.
Element copies all attributes and their values, including those generated by the XML processor to represent defaulted attributes, but this method does not copy any children it contains unless it is a deep clone. This includes text contained in an the
Element since the text is contained in a child
Text node. Cloning an
Attr directly, as opposed to be cloned as part of an
Element cloning operation, returns a specified attribute (
specified is
true). Cloning an
Attr always clones its children, since they represent its value, no matter whether this is a deep clone or not. Cloning an
EntityReference automatically constructs its subtree if a corresponding
Entity is available, no matter whether this is a deep clone or not. Cloning any other type of node simply returns a copy of this node.
EntityReference clone are readonly . In addition, clones of unspecified
Attr nodes are specified. And, cloning
Document,
DocumentType,
Entity, and
Notation nodes is implementation dependent.
deep - If
true, recursively clone the subtree under the specified node; if
false, clone only the node itself (and its attributes, if it is an
Element).
void normalize()
Text nodes in the full depth of the sub-tree underneath this
Node, including attribute nodes, into a "normal" form where only structure (e.g., elements, comments, processing instructions, CDATA sections, and entity references) separates
Text nodes, i.e., there are neither adjacent
Text nodes nor empty
Text nodes. This can be used to ensure that the DOM view of a document is the same as if it were saved and re-loaded, and is useful when operations (such as XPointer [
XPointer] lookups) that depend on a particular document tree structure are to be used. If the parameter "normalize-characters" of the
DOMConfiguration object attached to the
Node.ownerDocument is
true, this method will also fully normalize the characters of the
Text nodes.
Note: In cases where the document contains CDATASections, the normalize operation alone may not be sufficient, since XPointers do not differentiate between Text nodes and CDATASection nodes.
boolean isSupported(Stringfeature, String version)
feature - The name of the feature to test.
version - This is the version number of the feature to test.
true if the specified feature is supported on this node,
false otherwise.
StringgetNamespaceURI()
null if it is unspecified (see ).
ELEMENT_NODE and
ATTRIBUTE_NODE and nodes created with a DOM Level 1 method, such as
Document.createElement(), this is always
null.
Note: Per the Namespaces in XML Specification [XML Namespaces] an attribute does not inherit its namespace from the element it is attached to. If an attribute is not explicitly given a namespace, it simply has no namespace.
StringgetPrefix()
null if it is unspecified. When it is defined to be
null, setting it has no effect, including if the node is read-only.
nodeName attribute, which holds the qualified name, as well as the
tagName and
name attributes of the
Element and
Attr interfaces, when applicable.
null makes it unspecified, setting it to an empty string is implementation dependent.
namespaceURI and
localName do not change.
ELEMENT_NODE and
ATTRIBUTE_NODE and nodes created with a DOM Level 1 method, such as
createElement from the
Document interface, this is always
null.
void setPrefix(Stringprefix) throws DOMException
null if it is unspecified. When it is defined to be
null, setting it has no effect, including if the node is read-only.
nodeName attribute, which holds the qualified name, as well as the
tagName and
name attributes of the
Element and
Attr interfaces, when applicable.
null makes it unspecified, setting it to an empty string is implementation dependent.
namespaceURI and
localName do not change.
ELEMENT_NODE and
ATTRIBUTE_NODE and nodes created with a DOM Level 1 method, such as
createElement from the
Document interface, this is always
null.
DOMException - INVALID_CHARACTER_ERR: Raised if the specified prefix contains an illegal character according to the XML version in use specified in the
Document.xmlVersion attribute.
prefix is malformed per the Namespaces in XML specification, if the
namespaceURI of this node is
null, if the specified prefix is "xml" and the
namespaceURI of this node is different from "
http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace", if this node is an attribute and the specified prefix is "xmlns" and the
namespaceURI of this node is different from "
http://www.w3.org/2000/xmlns/", or if this node is an attribute and the
qualifiedName of this node is "xmlns" [
XML Namespaces] .
StringgetLocalName()
ELEMENT_NODE and
ATTRIBUTE_NODE and nodes created with a DOM Level 1 method, such as
Document.createElement(), this is always
null.
boolean hasAttributes()
true if this node has any attributes,
false otherwise.
StringgetBaseURI()
null if the implementation wasn't able to obtain an absolute URI. This value is computed as described in . However, when the
Document supports the feature "HTML" [
DOM Level 2 HTML] , the base URI is computed using first the value of the href attribute of the HTML BASE element if any, and the value of the
documentURI attribute from the
Document interface otherwise.
short compareDocumentPosition(Nodeother) throws DOMException
other - The node to compare against the reference node.
DOMException - NOT_SUPPORTED_ERR: when the compared nodes are from different DOM implementations that do not coordinate to return consistent implementation-specific results.
StringgetTextContent() throws DOMException
null, setting it has no effect. On setting, any possible children this node may have are removed and, if it the new string is not empty or
null, replaced by a single
Text node containing the string this attribute is set to.
Text.isElementContentWhitespace). Similarly, on setting, no parsing is performed either, the input string is taken as pure textual content.
| Node type | Content |
|---|---|
| ELEMENT_NODE, ATTRIBUTE_NODE, ENTITY_NODE, ENTITY_REFERENCE_NODE, DOCUMENT_FRAGMENT_NODE | concatenation of the textContent attribute value of every child node, excluding COMMENT_NODE and PROCESSING_INSTRUCTION_NODE nodes. This is the empty string if the node has no children. |
| TEXT_NODE, CDATA_SECTION_NODE, COMMENT_NODE, PROCESSING_INSTRUCTION_NODE | nodeValue |
| DOCUMENT_NODE, DOCUMENT_TYPE_NODE, NOTATION_NODE | null |
DOMException - DOMSTRING_SIZE_ERR: Raised when it would return more characters than fit in a
DOMString variable on the implementation platform.
void setTextContent(StringtextContent) throws DOMException
null, setting it has no effect. On setting, any possible children this node may have are removed and, if it the new string is not empty or
null, replaced by a single
Text node containing the string this attribute is set to.
Text.isElementContentWhitespace). Similarly, on setting, no parsing is performed either, the input string is taken as pure textual content.
| Node type | Content |
|---|---|
| ELEMENT_NODE, ATTRIBUTE_NODE, ENTITY_NODE, ENTITY_REFERENCE_NODE, DOCUMENT_FRAGMENT_NODE | concatenation of the textContent attribute value of every child node, excluding COMMENT_NODE and PROCESSING_INSTRUCTION_NODE nodes. This is the empty string if the node has no children. |
| TEXT_NODE, CDATA_SECTION_NODE, COMMENT_NODE, PROCESSING_INSTRUCTION_NODE | nodeValue |
| DOCUMENT_NODE, DOCUMENT_TYPE_NODE, NOTATION_NODE | null |
DOMException - NO_MODIFICATION_ALLOWED_ERR: Raised when the node is readonly.
boolean isSameNode(Nodeother)
Node references returned by the implementation reference the same object. When two
Node references are references to the same object, even if through a proxy, the references may be used completely interchangeably, such that all attributes have the same values and calling the same DOM method on either reference always has exactly the same effect.
other - The node to test against.
true if the nodes are the same,
false otherwise.
StringlookupPrefix(String namespaceURI)
namespaceURI - The namespace URI to look for.
null if none is found. If more than one prefix are associated to the namespace prefix, the returned namespace prefix is implementation dependent.
boolean isDefaultNamespace(StringnamespaceURI)
namespaceURI is the default namespace or not.
namespaceURI - The namespace URI to look for.
true if the specified
namespaceURI is the default namespace,
false otherwise.
StringlookupNamespaceURI(String prefix)
prefix - The prefix to look for. If this parameter is
null, the method will return the default namespace URI if any.
null if none is found.
boolean isEqualNode(Nodearg)
Node.isSameNode(). All nodes that are the same will also be equal, though the reverse may not be true.
nodeName, localName, namespaceURI, prefix, nodeValue . This is: they are both null, or they have the same length and are character for character identical. attributes NamedNodeMaps are equal. This is: they are both null, or they have the same length and for each node that exists in one map there is a node that exists in the other map and is equal, although not necessarily at the same index. childNodes NodeLists are equal. This is: they are both null, or they have the same length and contain equal nodes at the same index. Note that normalization can affect equality; to avoid this, nodes should be normalized before being compared. DocumentType nodes to be equal, the following conditions must also be satisfied:
publicId, systemId, internalSubset. entities NamedNodeMaps are equal. notations NamedNodeMaps are equal. ownerDocument,
baseURI, and
parentNode attributes, the
specified attribute for
Attr nodes, the
schemaTypeInfo attribute for
Attr and
Element nodes, the
Text.isElementContentWhitespace attribute for
Text nodes, as well as any user data or event listeners registered on the nodes.
Note: As a general rule, anything not mentioned in the description above is not significant in consideration of equality checking. Note that future versions of this specification may take into account more attributes and implementations conform to this specification are expected to be updated accordingly.
arg - The node to compare equality with.
true if the nodes are equal,
false otherwise.
ObjectgetFeature(String feature, String version)
Node interface.
feature - The name of the feature requested. Note that any plus sign "+" prepended to the name of the feature will be ignored since it is not significant in the context of this method.
version - This is the version number of the feature to test.
null if there is no object which implements interfaces associated with that feature. If the
DOMObject returned by this method implements the
Node interface, it must delegate to the primary core
Node and not return results inconsistent with the primary core
Node such as attributes, childNodes, etc.
ObjectsetUserData(String key, Object data, UserDataHandler handler)
getUserData with the same key.
key - The key to associate the object to.
data - The object to associate to the given key, or
null to remove any existing association to that key.
handler - The handler to associate to that key, or
null.
DOMUserData previously associated to the given key on this node, or
null if there was none.
ObjectgetUserData(String key)
setUserData with the same key.
key - The key the object is associated to.
DOMUserData associated to the given key on this node, or
null if there was none.