# REXML::Child (Class)

In: | rexml/child.rb
Parent: | Object

A Child object is something contained by a parent, and this class contains methods to support that. Most user code will not use this class directly.

## Methods

bytes document new next_sibling= parent= previous_sibling= remove replace_with

## External Aliases

next_sibling_node -> next_sibling
previous_sibling_node -> previous_sibling

## Attributes

parent | [R] |

## Included Modules

Node

## Public Class methods

new( parent = nil )

Constructor. Any inheritors of this class should call super to make sure this method is called.

parent: | if supplied, the parent of this child will be set to the supplied value, and self will be added to the parent

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 17
                    def initialize( parent = nil )
                            @parent = nil
                            # Declare @parent, but don't define it.  The next line sets the

                            # parent.

                            parent.add( self ) if parent
                    end

## Public Instance methods

replace_with( child )

Replaces this object with another object. Basically, calls Parent.replace_child

Returns: | self

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 28
                    def replace_with( child )
                            @parent.replace_child( self, child )
                            self
                    end

remove()

Removes this child from the parent.

Returns: | self

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 36
                    def remove
                            unless @parent.nil?
                                    @parent.delete self
                            end
                            self
                    end

parent=( other )

Sets the parent of this child to the supplied argument.

other: | Must be a Parent object. If this object is the same object as the existing parent of this child, no action is taken. Otherwise, this child is removed from the current parent (if one exists), and is added to the new parent.
Returns: | The parent added

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 51
                    def parent=( other )
                            return @parent if @parent == other
                            @parent.delete self if defined? @parent and @parent
                            @parent = other
                    end

next_sibling=( other )

Sets the next sibling of this child. This can be used to insert a child after some other child.

     a = Element.new("a")
     b = a.add_element("b")
     c = Element.new("c")
     b.next_sibling = c
     # => <a><b/><c/></a>

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 67
                    def next_sibling=( other )
                      parent.insert_after self, other
                    end

previous_sibling=(other)

Sets the previous sibling of this child. This can be used to insert a child before some other child.

     a = Element.new("a")
     b = a.add_element("b")
     c = Element.new("c")
     b.previous_sibling = c
     # => <a><b/><c/></a>

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 78
                    def previous_sibling=(other)
                      parent.insert_before self, other
                    end

document()

Returns: | the document this child belongs to, or nil if this child

belongs to no document

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 84
                    def document
                            return parent.document unless parent.nil?
                            nil
                    end

bytes()

This doesn’t yet handle encodings

[Source]

    # File rexml/child.rb, line 90
                    def bytes
                            encoding = document.encoding

                            to_s
                    end

[Validate]