NSDictionary到XML

Question

I'm trying to convert a NSDictionary to XML. (I was successful in transforming NSDictionary to JSON). But now I need to transform NSDictionary to XML. Is there a built-in serializer in Objective-C like the one for JSON?

int r = arc4random() % 999999999;

//simulate my NSDictionary (to be turned into xml)
NSString *name = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"Posted using iPhone_%d", r];
NSString *stock_no = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"2342_%d", r];
NSString *retail_price = @"12345";

NSArray *keys = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:@"name", @"stock_no", @"retail_price", nil];
NSArray *objects = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:name,stock_no,retail_price, nil];
NSDictionary *theRequestDictionary = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjects:objects forKeys:keys];

NSDictionary *theFinalRequestDictionary = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithObject:theRequestDictionary forKey:@"product"];

...//other irrelevant code omitted

NSData *theBodyData = [NSPropertyListSerialization dataFromPropertyList:theFinalRequestDictionary format:NSPropertyListXMLFormat_v1_0   errorDescription:nil];
NSPropertyListFormat format;

id XMLed = [NSPropertyListSerialization propertyListFromData:theBodyData
                                            mutabilityOption:NSPropertyListImmutable
                                                      format:&format
                                            errorDescription:nil];

NSLog(@"the XMLed is this: %@", [NSString stringWithFormat:@"%@", XMLed]);

The NSLog doesn't print a string in XML format. It prints it like a NSDictionary. What should I use to serialize my NSDictionary to XML?

Answer 1

propertyListFromData:... returns a "property list object", that is, depending on the contents of the data, an array or a dictionary. The thing that you're actually interested in (the xml) is returned by dataFromPropertyList:... and thus stored in your theBodyData variable.

Try this:

NSLog(@"XML: %@", [[[NSString alloc] initWithData:theBodyData encoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding] autorelease]);

Answer 2

There are many different varieties of XML. If you're not picky about the specific tags, and if the contents of your dictionary is limited to types used in property lists (NSString, NSNumber, NSDate, etc.) you can write your dictionary to a property list in one line:

[myDict writeToFile:somePath atomically:YES];

If you'd prefer to keep the XML in memory instead of writing to a file, use NSPropertyListSerialization as you're doing.