Parse XML file, read a tag with whitespaces value.

Question

Hi all,
I've got a problem with reading a spaced value record from xml file using sys.xmltype.
My xml file contains the following:
<?xml version = '1.0'?>;
<ROWSET>
<ROW num="1">
<FIRSTNAME>Nik</FIRSTNAME>
<LASTNAME> </LASTNAME>
<AGE>30</AGE>
</ROW>
</ROWSET>
As you see last name contains four spaces!
Now when I'm trying to read value from LASTNAME record I'm getting a NULL value, but I want it to return me those 4 spaces as they are.
Here is a short code description of what I'm doing:
declare
     xml sys.xmltype;
str1 varchar2(100);
str2 varchar2(100);
begin
     xml := sys.xmltype.createxml(fileContentClob); -- I copy the file content into the fileContentClob variable.
     If xml.existsnode('//ROW['1']/LASTNAME') > 0 Then -- This condition evaluates as true
str1 := xml.extract('//ROW['1']/LASTNAME/text()'); -- str1 gets NULL value :(, I want spaces as they are in the file.
str2 := xml.extract('//ROW[' || 1 || ']/LASTNAME').getstringval; -- str2 gets <LASTNAME/> null tag :(.
     End If;     
end;
Seems like when it createxml from the fileContentClob it ignores the spaces and find LASTNAME as a null field.
Do you have any suggestions on how can I fix that, so I can read whitespaces as they are in the file?
I generate the file also using a xml toolpackage from oracle:
declare
strSqlStmt Varchar2(300);
varCtxHdl dbms_xmlquery.ctxhandle;
varClob Clob;
begin
strSqlStmt := 'SELECT FIRSTNAME,LASTNAME,AGE FROM USERS WHERE ROWNUM =1';
varCtxHdl := dbms_xmlquery.newcontext(strSqlStmt);
varClob := dbms_xmlquery.getxml(varCtxHdl);
dbms_xmlquery.closecontext(varCtxHdl);
End;

Answer 1

Even if the STORE AS CLOB clause is used to store the data and preserve whitespace for the XML, the actual extraction of data seems to be removing whitespace...
SQL> ed
Wrote file afiedt.buf
  1* create table t (xml xmltype) xmltype xml store as clob
SQL> /
Table created.
SQL> ed
Wrote file afiedt.buf
  1  insert into t (xml)
  2  values (q'[<?xml version = '1.0'?>
  3  <ROWSET>
  4  <ROW num="1">
  5  <FIRSTNAME>Nik</FIRSTNAME>
  6  <LASTNAME>    </LASTNAME>
  7  <AGE>30</AGE>
  8  </ROW>
  9* </ROWSET>]')
SQL> /
1 row created.
SQL> select * from t;
XML
<?xml version = '1.0'?>
<ROWSET>
<ROW num="1">
<FIRSTNAME>Nik</FIRSTNAME>
<LASTNAME>    </LASTNAME>
<AGE>30</AGE>
</ROW>
</ROWSET>
SQL> set null NULL
SQL> select x.rnum, x.firstname, x.lastname, x.age
  2  from t
  3      ,xmltable('/ROWSET/ROW'
  4                PASSING t.xml
  5                COLUMNS rnum      NUMBER       PATH '/ROW/@num'
  6                       ,firstname VARCHAR2(10) PATH '/ROW/FIRSTNAME'
  7                       ,lastname  VARCHAR2(10) PATH '/ROW/LASTNAME'
  8                       ,age       NUMBER       PATH '/ROW/AGE'
  9               ) x
10  /
      RNUM FIRSTNAME  LASTNAME          AGE
         1 Nik        NULL               30
SQL>