Can I iterate through a NodeList using for-each in Java?

The workaround for this problem is straight-forward, and, thankfully you have to implements it only once.

import java.util.*;
import org.w3c.dom.*;

public final class XmlUtil {
  private XmlUtil(){}

  public static List<Node> asList(NodeList n) {
    return n.getLength()==0?
      Collections.<Node>emptyList(): new NodeListWrapper(n);
  }
  static final class NodeListWrapper extends AbstractList<Node>
  implements RandomAccess {
    private final NodeList list;
    NodeListWrapper(NodeList l) {
      list=l;
    }
    public Node get(int index) {
      return list.item(index);
    }
    public int size() {
      return list.getLength();
    }
  }
}

Once you have added this utility class to your project and added a static import for the XmlUtil.asList method to your source code you can use it like this:

for(Node n: asList(dom.getElementsByTagName("year"))) {
  …
}

public static Iterable<Node> iterable(final NodeList n) {
  return new Iterable<Node>() {

    @Override
    public Iterator<Node> iterator() {

      return new Iterator<Node>() {

        int index = 0;

        @Override
        public boolean hasNext() {
          return index < n.getLength();
        }

        @Override
        public Node next() {
          if (hasNext()) {
            return n.item(index++);
          } else {
            throw new NoSuchElementException();
          }  
        }

        @Override
        public void remove() {
          throw new UnsupportedOperationException();
        }
      };
    }
  };
}

Adding the happy little kotlin version for sience:

fun NodeList.forEach(action: (Node) -> Unit) {
    (0 until this.length)
            .asSequence()
            .map { this.item(it) }
            .forEach { action(it) }
}

One can then use it with nodeList.forEach { do_something_awesome() }


I know it is late to the party, but...
Since Java-8 you can write @RayHulha's solution even more concisely by using lambda expression (for creating a new Iterable) and default method (for Iterator.remove):

public static Iterable<Node> iterable(final NodeList nodeList) {
    return () -> new Iterator<Node>() {

        private int index = 0;

        @Override
        public boolean hasNext() {
            return index < nodeList.getLength();
        }

        @Override
        public Node next() {
            if (!hasNext())
                throw new NoSuchElementException();
            return nodeList.item(index++); 
        }
    };
}

and then use it like this:

NodeList nodeList = ...;
for (Node node : iterable(nodeList)) {
    // ....
}

or equivalently like this:

NodeList nodeList = ...;
iterable(nodeList).forEach(node -> {
    // ....
});

Tags:

Java

Xml

Dom