'xmlParseEntityRef: no name' warnings while loading xml into a php file

Question

I am reading an xml in php using simplexml_load_file. However while trying to load the xml it displays a list of warnings

Warning: simplexml_load_file() [function.simplexml-load-file]: <project orderno="6" campaign_name="International Relief & Development" project in /home/bluecard1/public_html/test.php on line 3    
Warning: simplexml_load_file() [function.simplexml-load-file]: ^ in /home/bluecard1/public_html/test.php on line 3    
Warning: simplexml_load_file() [function.simplexml-load-file]: http://..../index.php/site/projects/:15: parser error : xmlParseEntityRef: no name in /home/bluecard1/public_html/test.php on line 3

Warning: simplexml_load_file() [function.simplexml-load-file]: ional Relief & Development" project_id="313" client_name="International Relief & in /home/bluecard1/public_html/test.php on line 3    
Warning: simplexml_load_file() [function.simplexml-load-file]: ^ in /home/bluecard1/public_html/test.php on line 3    
Warning: simplexml_load_file() [function.simplexml-load-file]: http://..../index.php/site/projects/:15: parser error : xmlParseEntityRef: no name in /home/bluecard1/public_html/test.php on line 3

How do I rectify to remove these warnings?

(XML is generated from url http://..../index.php/site/projects & loaded into a variable in the test.php. I dont have write priveleges to index.php)

Answer 1

The XML is most probably invalid.

The problem could be the "&"

$text=preg_replace('/&(?!#?[a-z0-9]+;)/g', '&', $text);

will get rid of the "&" and replace it with it's HTML code version...give it a try.

Answer 2

Found this here ...

Problem: An XML parser returns the error “xmlParseEntityRef: noname”

Cause: There is a stray ‘&’ (ampersand character) somewhere in the XML text eg. some text & some more text

Solution:

• Solution 1: Remove the ampersand.
• Solution 2: Encode the ampersand (that is replace the & character with & ). Remember to Decode when reading the XML text.
• Solution 3: Use CDATA sections (text inside a CDATA section will be ignored by the parser.) eg. <![CDATA[some text & some more text]]>

Note: ‘&’ ‘<' '>‘ will all give problems if not handled correctly.

Answer 3

Try to clean the HTML first using this function:

$html = htmlspecialchars($html);

Special chars are usually represented differently in HTML and it might be confusing for the compiler. Like & becomes &.