Sjoerd Mullender writes:

Here is my current version of xmllib.py and the documentation.  This
version has some API changes with respect to the version currently in
Python (also the one in 1.5.2a).
This version supports XML namespaces.

Doc/lib/libxmllib.tex

@@ -14,7 +14,28 @@ for parsing text files formatted in XML (eXtended Markup Language).
 The \class{XMLParser} class must be instantiated without arguments.
 \end{classdesc}
 
-This class provides the following interface methods:
+This class provides the following interface methods and instance variables:
+
+\begin{memberdesc}{attributes}
+A mapping of element names to mappings.  The latter mapping maps
+attribute names that are valid for the element to the default value of 
+the attribute, or if there is no default to \code{None}.  The default
+value is the empty dictionary.
+\end{memberdesc}
+
+\begin{memberdesc}{elements} 
+A mapping of element names to tuples.  The tuples contain a function
+for handling the start and end tag respectively of the element, or
+\code{None} if the method \method{unknown_starttag()} or
+\method{unknown_endtag()} is to be called.  The default value is the
+empty dictionary.
+\end{memberdesc}
+
+\begin{memberdesc}{entitydefs}
+A mapping of entitynames to their values.  The default value contains
+definitions for \code{'lt'}, \code{'gt'}, \code{'amp'}, \code{'quot'}, 
+and \code{'apos'}.
+\end{memberdesc}
 
 \begin{methoddesc}{reset}{}
 Reset the instance.  Loses all unprocessed data.  This is called
@@ -33,7 +54,7 @@ when the close tag matching the last unclosed open tag is encountered.
 
 \begin{methoddesc}{feed}{data}
 Feed some text to the parser.  It is processed insofar as it consists
-of complete elements; incomplete data is buffered until more data is
+of complete tags; incomplete data is buffered until more data is
 fed or \method{close()} is called.
 \end{methoddesc}
 
@@ -65,29 +86,29 @@ the root element.
 \end{methoddesc}
 
 \begin{methoddesc}{handle_starttag}{tag, method, attributes}
-This method is called to handle start tags for which a
-\method{start_\var{tag}()} method has been defined.  The \var{tag}
-argument is the name of the tag, and the \var{method} argument is the
-bound method which should be used to support semantic interpretation
-of the start tag.  The \var{attributes} argument is a dictionary of
-attributes, the key being the \var{name} and the value being the
-\var{value} of the attribute found inside the tag's \code{<>} brackets.
-Character and entity references in the \var{value} have
-been interpreted.  For instance, for the tag
+This method is called to handle start tags for which a start tag
+handler is defined in the instance variable \member{elements}.  The
+\var{tag} argument is the name of the tag, and the \var{method}
+argument is the function (method) which should be used to support semantic
+interpretation of the start tag.  The \var{attributes} argument is a
+dictionary of attributes, the key being the \var{name} and the value
+being the \var{value} of the attribute found inside the tag's
+\code{<>} brackets.  Character and entity references in the
+\var{value} have been interpreted.  For instance, for the start tag
 \code{<A HREF="http://www.cwi.nl/">}, this method would be called as
-\code{handle_starttag('A', self.start_A, \{'HREF': 'http://www.cwi.nl/'\})}.
+\code{handle_starttag('A', self.elements['A'][0], \{'HREF': 'http://www.cwi.nl/'\})}.
 The base implementation simply calls \var{method} with \var{attributes}
 as the only argument.
 \end{methoddesc}
 
 \begin{methoddesc}{handle_endtag}{tag, method}
-This method is called to handle endtags for which an
-\method{end_\var{tag}()} method has been defined.  The \var{tag}
-argument is the name of the tag, and the
-\var{method} argument is the bound method which should be used to
-support semantic interpretation of the end tag.  If no
-\method{end_\var{tag}()} method is defined for the closing element, this
-handler is not called.  The base implementation simply calls
+This method is called to handle endtags for which an end tag handler
+is defined in the instance variable \member{elements}.  The \var{tag}
+argument is the name of the tag, and the \var{method} argument is the
+function (method) which should be used to support semantic
+interpretation of the end tag.  For instance, for the endtag
+\code{</A>}, this method would be called as \code{handle_endtag('A',
+self.elements['A'][1])}.  The base implementation simply calls
 \var{method}.
 \end{methoddesc}
 
@@ -149,7 +170,7 @@ closing delimiter, but not the delimiter itself.  For example, the
 instruction \samp{<?XML text?>} will cause this method to be called
 with the arguments \code{'XML'} and \code{'text'}.  The default method
 does nothing.  Note that if a document starts with \samp{<?xml
-...?>}, \method{handle_xml()} is called to handle it.
+..?>}, \method{handle_xml()} is called to handle it.
 \end{methoddesc}
 
 \begin{methoddesc}{handle_special}{data}
@@ -196,32 +217,21 @@ intended to be overridden by a derived class; the base class
 implementation does nothing.
 \end{methoddesc}
 
-Apart from overriding or extending the methods listed above, derived
-classes may also define methods and variables of the following form to
-define processing of specific tags.  Tag names in the input stream are
-case dependent; the \var{tag} occurring in method names must be in the
-correct case:
-
-\begin{methoddescni}{start_\var{tag}}{attributes}
-This method is called to process an opening tag \var{tag}.  The
-\var{attributes} argument has the same meaning as described for
-\method{handle_starttag()} above.  In fact, the base implementation of
-\method{handle_starttag()} calls this method.
-\end{methoddescni}
-
-\begin{methoddescni}{end_\var{tag}}{}
-This method is called to process a closing tag \var{tag}.
-\end{methoddescni}
-
-\begin{memberdescni}{\var{tag}_attributes}
-If a class or instance variable \member{\var{tag}_attributes} exists, it 
-should be a list or a dictionary.  If a list, the elements of the list 
-are the valid attributes for the element \var{tag}; if a dictionary,
-the keys are the valid attributes for the element \var{tag}, and the
-values the default values of the attributes, or \code{None} if there
-is no default.
-In addition to the attributes that were present in the tag, the
-attribute dictionary that is passed to \method{handle_starttag()} and
-\method{unknown_starttag()} contains values for all attributes that
-have a default value.
-\end{memberdescni}
+\subsection{XML Namespaces}
+
+This module has support for XML namespaces as defined in the XML
+Namespaces proposed recommendation.
+
+Tag and attribute names that are defined in an XML namespace are
+handled as if the name of the tag or element consisted of the
+namespace (i.e. the URL that defines the namespace) followed by a
+space and the name of the tag or attribute.  For instance, the tag
+\code{<html xmlns='http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40'>} is treated as if 
+the tag name was \code{'http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40 html'}, and
+the tag \code{<html:a href='http://frob.com'>} inside the above
+mentioned element is treated as if the tag name were
+\code{'http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40 a'} and the attribute name as
+if it were \code{'http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40 src'}.
+
+An older draft of the XML Namespaces proposal is also recognized, but
+triggers a warning.