Working with XML and JSON

XML and JSON are the dominant formats to structure data that can be exchanged between parts of a system such as backend-frontend or between external systems. In Scala, there is some out-of-the-box support in the Scala library to manipulate both.

Manipulating XML

We have briefly seen earlier in this chapter as well as in Chapter 3, Understanding the Scala Ecosystem, when working with HTTP that XML documents can be created as literals and transformed in many ways. For instance, if we launch an REPL by typing > play console from a Play project root directory, we can start experimenting with XML:

scala> val books =
       <Library>
         <book title="Programming in Scala" quantity="15" price="30.00" />
         <book title="Scala for Java Developers" quantity="10" price="25.50" />
       </Library>
books: scala.xml.Elem = 
<Library>
  <book title="Programming in Scala" quantity="15" price="30.00"/>
  <book title="Scala for...