PHP DOM-XPath on a Table

Question

I am trying to extract data from a table using...

 $tags = $xpath->query('//tr[@valign="top"]/td/span[@style="background-color:#cccccc;font-weight:bold;"]');

on a row that looks like...

 <tr valign="top"> <td style="background-color:#cccccc;"><span style="background-color:#cccccc;font-weight:bold;">Some Company</span>

But its not retrieving the data, it works using the DOM inspector in firebug... using the xpath...

 $tags = $xpath->query('//tr[@valign="top"]/td/span');

works but it pulls other data not wanted. Any suggestions?

Wayne · Accepted Answer · 2011-12-10 04:55:59Z

1

Is it possible there is some ordering/formatting issue with those style properties? Try the following:

//tr[@valign="top"]/td/span[contains(@style, 'background-color:#cccccc') and contains(@style, 'font-weight:bold')]

You could also try selecting based on the contents of the cell (assuming the value is unique):

//tr[@valign="top"]/td/span[.='Some Company']

Or (less restrictive):

//tr[@valign="top"]/td/span[contains(., 'Some Company')]

answered Dec 10, 2011 at 4:55

Wayne

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5 Comments

savagenoob Over a year ago

The value is not unique and it is a list, so I need that node of each table row. I tried your first example to no avail. Do single or double quotes matter? PHP wont let me use the ' without a \' in front of it. I cant see any ordering/formatting issues, as I copied the above row as it shows on the page source.

Wayne Over a year ago

@savagenoob - Copied from the actual source, or from what Firebug showed you?

Wayne Over a year ago

@savagenoob - Also, have you tried selecting by position? //tr[@valign="top"]/td/span[1]

Wayne Over a year ago

@savagenoob - If you provide a more complete sample input, I'll try to provide a more accurate expression.

savagenoob Over a year ago

I realized that I used $html = @mb_convert_encoding($html, 'HTML-ENTITIES', 'utf-8'); when doing the cURL to get the page which changed the layout. Thanks for the help.

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