PHP Manual: Create new element node with an associated namespace

Description

public DOMElementfalse DOMDocument::createElementNS(stringnull $namespace, string $qualifiedName, string $value = "")

This function creates a new element node with an associated namespace. This node will not show up in the document unless it is inserted with (e.g.) DOMNode::appendChild.

Parameters

namespace: The URI of the namespace.
qualifiedName: The qualified name of the element, as prefix:tagname.
value: The value of the element. By default, an empty element will be created. You can also set the value later with DOMElement::$nodeValue.

Return Values

The new DOMElement or false if an error occurred.

Errors/Exceptions

DOM_INVALID_CHARACTER_ERR: Raised if qualifiedName contains an invalid character.
DOM_NAMESPACE_ERR: Raised if qualifiedName is a malformed qualified name.

Examples

Example #1 Creating a new element and inserting it as root

<?php

$dom = new DOMDocument('1.0', 'utf-8');

$element = $dom->createElementNS('http://www.example.com/XFoo', 'xfoo:test', 'This is the root element!');

// We insert the new element as root (child of the document)
$dom->appendChild($element);

echo $dom->saveXML();
?>

The above example will output:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<xfoo:test xmlns:xfoo="http://www.example.com/XFoo">This is the root element!</xfoo:test>

Example #2 A namespace prefix example

<?php
$doc  = new DOMDocument('1.0', 'utf-8');
$doc->formatOutput = true;
$root = $doc->createElementNS('http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom', 'element');
$doc->appendChild($root);
$root->setAttributeNS('http://www.w3.org/2000/xmlns/' ,'xmlns:g', 'http://base.google.com/ns/1.0');
$item = $doc->createElementNS('http://base.google.com/ns/1.0', 'g:item_type', 'house');
$root->appendChild($item);

echo $doc->saveXML(), "\n";

echo $item->namespaceURI, "\n"; // Outputs: http://base.google.com/ns/1.0
echo $item->prefix, "\n";       // Outputs: g
echo $item->localName, "\n";    // Outputs: item_type
?>