XML DOM Parse Error Object

Microsoft's parseError object can be used to retrieve error information from the Microsoft XML parser.

To see how Firefox handles parser errors, check out the next page of this tutorial.

The parseError Object

When trying to open an XML document, a parser-error may occur.

With the parseError object, you can retrieve the error code, the error text, the line that caused the error, and more.

Note: The parseError object is not a part of the W3C DOM standard!

File Error

In the following code we will try to load a non-existing file, and display some of its error properties:

xmlDoc=new ActiveXObject("Microsoft.XMLDOM");
xmlDoc.async="false";
xmlDoc.load("ksdjf.xml");

document.write("Error code: " + xmlDoc.parseError.errorCode);
document.write("<br />Error reason: " + xmlDoc.parseError.reason);
document.write("<br />Error line: " + xmlDoc.parseError.line);

Try it yourself

XML Error

In the following code we let the parser load an XML document that is not well-formed.

(You can read more about well-formed and valid XML in our XML tutorial)

xmlDoc=new ActiveXObject("Microsoft.XMLDOM");
xmlDoc.async="false";
xmlDoc.load("note_error.xml");

document.write("Error code: " + xmlDoc.parseError.errorCode);
document.write("<br />Error reason: " + xmlDoc.parseError.reason);
document.write("<br />Error line: " + xmlDoc.parseError.line);

Try it yourself or just look at the XML file

The parseError Object's Properties