stanfordnlp/CoreNLP · error · RuntimeException

Error configuring XML parser

Error message

Error configuring XML parser: ${e}

What it means

TransformXML's constructor configures a secure SAXParserFactory. If the JAXP factory cannot be created or the secure-processing feature cannot be set, the exception is logged and rethrown as RuntimeException. This usually indicates a broken or unusual JAXP/SAX environment.

Solutions

  1. Remove conflicting XML parser jars (xerces, old SAX implementations) from the classpath so the JDK default parser is used
  2. If using a custom parser, upgrade it to one supporting FEATURE_SECURE_PROCESSING
  3. Set the system property javax.xml.parsers.SAXParserFactory explicitly to a working implementation
  4. Unwrap the cause (the RuntimeException's cause) to identify which setup step failed

Example fix

// before (classpath has stale xercesImpl-2.0.jar)
java -cp lib/*:app.jar Main
// after
rm lib/xercesImpl-2.0.jar
java -cp lib/*:app.jar Main
Defensive patterns

Strategy: try-catch

Validate before calling

try {
  SAXParserFactory.newInstance().newSAXParser();
} catch (Exception e) {
  throw new IllegalStateException("No working JAXP SAX parser on classpath", e);
}

Try / catch

try {
  new TransformXML<String>();
} catch (RuntimeException e) {
  e.getCause().printStackTrace(); // parser config failure
}

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: Constructing TransformXML when SAXParserFactory.newInstance() returns a misconfigured factory, or spf.setFeature(XMLConstants.FEATURE_SECURE_PROCESSING, true) throws ParserConfigurationException/SAXNotRecognizedException — e.g. a non-standard JAXP implementation on the classpath.

Common situations: Conflicting XML parser jars (xercesImpl, old sax jars) shadowing the JDK's; running on restricted runtimes where FEATURE_SECURE_PROCESSING is unsupported; broken META-INF/services javax.xml.parsers.SAXParserFactory entry.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of stanfordnlp/CoreNLP@1b7edd19c4 (2026-09-10). Data as JSON: /api/errors/13f64a8dc7ec6ea5. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at src/edu/stanford/nlp/process/TransformXML.java:203

    @Override
    public void processText(String text) {
      if (text.length() > 0) {
        text = function.apply(text).toString();
        outWriter.print(text);
        outWriter.print('\n');
      }
    }    
  }


  public TransformXML() {
    try {
      SAXParserFactory spf = SAXParserFactory.newInstance();
      spf.setFeature(XMLConstants.FEATURE_SECURE_PROCESSING, true);
      saxParser = spf.newSAXParser();
    } catch (Exception e) {
      log.info("Error configuring XML parser: " + e);
      throw new RuntimeException(e);
    }
  }


  /**
   * Read XML from the specified file and write XML to stdout,
   * while transforming text appearing inside the specified XML
   * tags by applying the specified {@link Function
   * <code>Function</code>}.  Note that the <code>Function</code>
   * you supply must be prepared to accept <code>String</code>s as
   * input; if your <code>Function</code> doesn't handle
   * <code>String</code>s, you need to write a wrapper for it that
   * does.
   *
   * @param tags an array of <code>String</code>s, each an XML tag
   *             within which the transformation should be applied
   * @param fn   the {@link Function <code>Function</code>} to apply
   * @param in   the <code>File</code> to read from

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