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XML DOM Node Types


DOM represents a document with a node object hierarchy.


Try It Yourself - Examples

The following examples use the XML file books.xml. loadXMLDoc(), located in an external JavaScript, is used to load the XML file.

Display nodeName and nodeType of all elements

Display nodeName and nodeValue of all elements


Node Types

The table below lists different W3C node types, each potentially containing subclasses:

Node Type Description Subclasses
Document Represents the entire document (root of the DOM tree) Element (max. one), ProcessingInstruction, Comment, DocumentType
DocumentFragment Represents a "lightweight" Document object that can hold a portion of a document Element, ProcessingInstruction, Comment, Text, CDATASection, EntityReference
DocumentType Provides an interface to the entities defined in the document None
ProcessingInstruction Represents a processing instruction None
EntityReference Represents an entity reference Element, ProcessingInstruction, Comment, Text, CDATASection, EntityReference
Element Represents an element Element, Text, Comment, ProcessingInstruction, CDATASection, EntityReference
Attr Represents an attribute Text, EntityReference
Text Represents the text content of an element or attribute None
CDATASection Represents a CDATA section in the document (text not parsed by the parser) None
Comment Represents a comment None
Entity Represents an entity Element, ProcessingInstruction, Comment, Text, CDATASection, EntityReference
Notation Defines a symbol declared in the DTD None

Node Types - Return Values

The table below lists the node name (nodeName) and node value (nodeValue) returned for each node type:

Node Type Returned Node Name Returned Node Value
Document #document null
DocumentFragment #document-fragment null
DocumentType Document type name null
EntityReference Entity reference name null
Element Element name null
Attr Attribute name Attribute value
ProcessingInstruction Target Node content
Comment #comment Comment text
Text #text Node content
CDATASection #cdata-section Node content
Entity Entity name null
Notation Notation name null

Node Types - Named Constants

Node Type Named Constant
1 ELEMENT_NODE
2 ATTRIBUTE_NODE
3 TEXT_NODE
4 CDATA_SECTION_NODE
5 ENTITY_REFERENCE_NODE
6 ENTITY_NODE
7 PROCESSING_INSTRUCTION_NODE
8 COMMENT_NODE
9 DOCUMENT_NODE
10 DOCUMENT_TYPE_NODE
11 DOCUMENT_FRAGMENT_NODE
12 NOTATION_NODE
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