SAX Parser Global Variable problem

Question

Can someone tell me what i am doing wrong.
i have a javabean called querybean that i store cdata from an xml file. i also have a map that i want to store this querybean in.
when i debug this, i can see the map being populated in my end element event call, but when i return the map, there is nothing in it.
I'm not really sure why this is. is the calling of the parser events run on a differnt thread or something.
here is my code
public class XmlParsing extends DefaultHandler implements LexicalHandler{
     String reportId = null;
     boolean cdataSection = false;
     StringBuffer cdataString = new StringBuffer();
     Map queryMap = new HashMap();
     QueryBean queryBean = new QueryBean();
     public static final String LEXICAL_SAX_PROPERTY =
     "http://xml.org/sax/properties/lexical-handler";
     public Map XmlPassThrough(File file)
          DefaultHandler handler = new XmlParsing();
          SAXParserFactory factory = SAXParserFactory.newInstance();
          try
          SAXParser saxParser = factory.newSAXParser();
          saxParser.setProperty("http://xml.org/sax/properties/lexical-handler",handler);
          saxParser.parse(file,handler);
          catch(Exception e)
               e.printStackTrace();
          return this.queryMap;
     //////////Setters and Getters////////////////////////////
     public String getReportId() {
          return reportId;
     public void setReportId(String reportId) {
          this.reportId = reportId;
     public boolean isCdataSection() {
          return cdataSection;
     public void setCdataSection(boolean cdataSection) {
          this.cdataSection = cdataSection;
     public StringBuffer getCdataString() {
          return cdataString;
     public void setCdataString(StringBuffer cdataString) {
          this.cdataString = cdataString;
     public Map getQueryMap() {
          return queryMap;
     public void setQueryMap(Map queryMap) {
          this.queryMap = queryMap;
     /* Handler Methods*/
     public void startDocument() throws SAXException{
          System.out.println("Start of Document");
     public void endDocument() throws SAXException{
          System.out.println("End of Document");
     public void startElement(String namespaceURI,
                                   String lName,
                                   String qName,
                                   Attributes attrs)
     throws SAXException
          String eName = lName;
          if("".equals(eName)) eName = qName;
          if(qName.equals("sql"))
                         queryBean.setReportID(attrs.getValue("report_id"));
                         queryBean.setReportType(attrs.getValue("report_type"));
                         if(attrs.getValue("report_start_date").equals("true"))
                         queryBean.setReport_start_date(true);
                         else
                              queryBean.setReport_start_date(false);
     public void endElement(String namespaceURI,
String sName, // simple name
String qName // qualified name
throws SAXException
          if(qName.equals("select"))
               queryBean.setSelect(this.getCdataString());
          else if(qName.equals("from"))
               queryBean.setFrom(this.getCdataString());
          else if(qName.equals("where"))
               queryBean.setWhere(this.getCdataString());
          else if(qName.equals("group"))
               queryBean.setGroup(this.getCdataString());
          else if(qName.equals("order"))
               queryBean.setOrder(this.getCdataString());
          else if(qName.equals("sql"))
               this.queryMap.put(queryBean.getReportID(),queryBean);
               this.setQueryMap(queryMap);
          this.cdataString.setLength(0);
     public void characters(char buf[], int offset, int len)
throws SAXException
          if(this.isCdataSection())
               String str = new String(buf,offset,len);
               this.cdataString.append(str);
     /* LexicalHandler Methods*/
     public void endCDATA() throws SAXException {
          // TODO Auto-generated method stub
          System.out.println(this.cdataString.toString());
          System.out.println("end of CDATASECTION");
          this.setCdataSection(false);
     public void endDTD() throws SAXException {
          // TODO Auto-generated method stub
     public void startCDATA() throws SAXException {
          // TODO Auto-generated method stub
          System.out.println("Start of CDATASECTION");
          this.setCdataSection(true);
     public void comment(char[] ch, int start, int length) throws SAXException {
          // TODO Auto-generated method stub
     public void endEntity(String name) throws SAXException {
          // TODO Auto-generated method stub
     public void startEntity(String name) throws SAXException {
          // TODO Auto-generated method stub
     public void startDTD(String name, String publicId, String systemId) throws SAXException {
          // TODO Auto-generated method stub
     }

Answer 1

Well, despite all your copious use of "this" you actually have two instances of your class. You create one, then in its XmlPassThrough method you create a second one to be the handler for the first one. The second one is where you accumulate all your data, and then you return the empty data from the first one.
So remove this line:DefaultHandler handler = new XmlParsing();and replace all references to the "handler" variable by "this". That way your XmlParsing object acts as its own handler and accumulates data in its own fields.