PHP DOMDocument loadHTML not encoding UTF-8 correctly

Question

I\'m trying to parse some HTML using DOMDocument, but when I do, I suddenly lose my encoding (at least that is how it appears to me).

$profile = \"

        

Answer 1

This worked for me.

In php.ini file, change the following property.

Before:

mbstring.encoding_transration = On

After:

mbstring.encoding_transration = Off

Answer 2

Make sure the real source file is saved as UTF-8 (You may even want to try the non-recommended BOM Chars with UTF-8 to make sure).

Also in case of HTML, make sure you have declared the correct encoding using meta tags:

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">

If it's a CMS (as you've tagged your question with Joomla) you may need to configure appropriate settings for the encoding.

Answer 3

The problem is with saveHTML() and saveXML(), both of them do not work correctly in Unix. They do not save UTF-8 characters correctly when used in Unix, but they work in Windows.

The workaround is very simple:

If you try the default, you will get the error you described

$str = $dom->saveHTML(); // saves incorrectly

All you have to do is save as follows:

$str = $dom->saveHTML($dom->documentElement); // saves correctly

This line of code will get your UTF-8 characters to be saved correctly. Use the same workaround if you are using saveXML().

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Update

As suggested by "Jack M" in the comments section below, and verified by "Pamela" and "Marco Aurélio Deleu", the following variation might work in your case:

$str = utf8_decode($dom->saveHTML($dom->documentElement));

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Note

1. English characters do not cause any problem when you use saveHTML() without parameters (because English characters are saved as single byte characters in UTF-8)

2. The problem happens when you have multi-byte characters (such as Chinese, Russian, Arabic, Hebrew, ...etc.)

I recommend reading this article: http://coding.smashingmagazine.com/2012/06/06/all-about-unicode-utf8-character-sets/. You will understand how UTF-8 works and why you have this problem. It will take you about 30 minutes, but it is time well spent.

Answer 4

You must feed the DOMDocument a version of your HTML with a header that make sense. Just like HTML5.

$profile ='<?xml version="1.0" encoding="'.$_encoding.'"?>'. $html;

maybe is a good idea to keep your html as valid as you can, so you don't get into issues when you'll start query... around :-) and stay away from htmlentities!!!! That's an an necessary back and forth wasting resources. keep your code insane!!!!

Answer 5

The problem is that when you add a parameter to DOMDocument::saveHTML() function, you lose the encoding. In a few cases, you'll need to avoid the use of the parameter and use old string function to find what your are looking for.

I think the previous answer works for you, but since this workaround didn't work for me, I'm adding that answer to help people who may be in my case.

Answer 6

This took me a while to figure out but here's my answer.

Before using DomDocument I would use file_get_contents to retrieve urls and then process them with string functions. Perhaps not the best way but quick. After being convinced Dom was just as quick I first tried the following:

$dom = new DomDocument('1.0', 'UTF-8');
if ($dom->loadHTMLFile($url) == false) { // read the url
    // error message
}
else {
    // process
}

This failed spectacularly in preserving UTF-8 encoding despite the proper meta tags, php settings and all the rest of the remedies offered here and elsewhere. Here's what works:

$dom = new DomDocument('1.0', 'UTF-8');
$str = file_get_contents($url);
if ($dom->loadHTML(mb_convert_encoding($str, 'HTML-ENTITIES', 'UTF-8')) == false) {
}

etc. Now everything's right with the world. Hope this helps.