SwiftSoup is a Swift library for parsing and manipulating HTML and XML documents, similar to Jsoup in the Java ecosystem. It provides a set of functionalities to navigate the structure of a document, select elements, and extract data.
To navigate a document's structure with SwiftSoup, first, you need to parse the HTML content into a Document object. Then you can use various methods provided by SwiftSoup to traverse the node tree, select elements, and extract attributes, text, or HTML.
Here's a step-by-step guide on how to navigate a document's structure with SwiftSoup:
- Import SwiftSoup: Ensure you have SwiftSoup added to your project. If you are using CocoaPods, you can add it to your
Podfile:
pod 'SwiftSoup'
Then run pod install to install the library.
- Parse the Document: Obtain the HTML content you want to parse, and create a
Documentobject with it.
import SwiftSoup
let html = "<html><head><title>First parse</title></head>"
+ "<body><p>Parsed HTML into a doc.</p></body></html>"
do {
let doc: Document = try SwiftSoup.parse(html)
// Now you can navigate the document
} catch Exception.Error(let type, let message) {
print(message)
} catch {
print("error")
}
- Select Elements: Use selectors to find elements within the document. SwiftSoup's selection syntax is similar to CSS query selectors.
do {
let elements: Elements = try doc.select("p")
for element in elements.array() {
print(try element.text())
}
} catch Exception.Error(let type, let message) {
print(message)
} catch {
print("error")
}
- Traverse the Document: You can traverse the document using methods like
children(),siblingElements(),parent(), etc.
do {
let body: Element? = try doc.body()
if let bodyElements = try body?.children() {
for child in bodyElements.array() {
print(try child.tagName())
}
}
} catch Exception.Error(let type, let message) {
print(message)
} catch {
print("error")
}
- Extract Data: Once you've selected the elements, you can extract the data you need, such as attributes, text, or HTML.
do {
let p: Element? = try doc.select("p").first()
if let text = try p?.text() {
print(text) // Prints "Parsed HTML into a doc."
}
if let html = try p?.outerHtml() {
print(html) // Prints "<p>Parsed HTML into a doc.</p>"
}
} catch Exception.Error(let type, let message) {
print(message)
} catch {
print("error")
}
Remember to always wrap your SwiftSoup calls in try-catch blocks, as the library's methods can throw errors if something goes wrong while parsing or selecting elements.
By following these steps, you can effectively navigate and manipulate the structure of HTML documents using SwiftSoup in your Swift applications.
