java NullPointerException when parsing XML
- by behrk2
Hi Everyone,
I keep receiving a java.lang.NullPointerException while trying to parse out the values of ths  tags in the following XML sample:
<?xml version="1.0" standalone="yes"?>
<autocomplete>
  <autocomplete_item>
    <title short="Forrest Gump"></title>
  </autocomplete_item>
  <autocomplete_item>
    <title short="Forrest Landis"></title>
  </autocomplete_item>
  <autocomplete_item>
    <title short="Finding Forrester"></title>
  </autocomplete_item>
  <autocomplete_item>
    <title short="Menotti: The Medium: Maureen Forrester"></title>
  </autocomplete_item>
</autocomplete>
Here is my parsing code, can anyone see where I am going wrong? Thanks!
public String parse(String element) {
        Document doc = null;
        String result = null;
        DocumentBuilderFactory docBuilderFactory = DocumentBuilderFactory
                .newInstance();
        DocumentBuilder docBuilder = null;
        try {
            docBuilder = docBuilderFactory.newDocumentBuilder();
        } catch (ParserConfigurationException e1) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e1.printStackTrace();
        }
        docBuilder.isValidating();
        try {
            doc = docBuilder.parse(input);
        } catch (SAXException e) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        } catch (IOException e) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
        doc.getDocumentElement().normalize();
        NodeList list = doc.getElementsByTagName(element);
        _node = new String();
        _element = new String();
        for (int i = 0; i < list.getLength(); i++) {
            Node value = list.item(i).getChildNodes().item(0);
            _node = list.item(i).getNodeName();
            _element = value.getNodeValue();
            result = _element;
            SearchResults searchResults = new SearchResults();
            searchResults.setTitles(result);
            Vector test = searchResults.getTitles();
            for (int p = 0; p < test.size(); p++) {
                System.out.println("STUFF: " + test.elementAt(p));
            }
        }// end for
        return result;
    }