xml-doclet

This library provides a doclet to output the javadoc comments from Java source code to an XML document.
Works with Java 11 and above, supporting up to Java 17 (handling Records and Sealed classes as normal classes).

Usage

If you are using Maven you can use this doclet by adding the following configuration to your pom.xml:

<plugin>
  <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
  <artifactId>maven-javadoc-plugin</artifactId>
  <configuration>
    <doclet>com.automation.xmldoclet.XmlDoclet</doclet>
    <additionalparam>
        -d ${project.build.directory}
        -filename ${project.artifactId}-${project.version}-javadoc.xml
    </additionalparam>
    <useStandardDocletOptions>false</useStandardDocletOptions>
    <docletArtifact>
      <groupId>com.automation</groupId>
      <artifactId>xml-doclet</artifactId>
      <version>2.0.0</version>
    </docletArtifact>
  </configuration>
</plugin>

If you are not using maven, you can use the jar-with-dependencies, which contains all required libraries.

javadoc -doclet com.automation.xmldoclet.XmlDoclet \
  -docletpath xml-doclet-2.0.0-jar-with-dependencies.jar \
  [Javadoc- and XmlDoclet-Options]

Options

-d <directory>            Destination directory for output file.
                          Default: .

-docencoding <encoding>   Encoding of the output file.
                          Default: UTF8

-dryrun                   Parse javadoc, but don't write output file.
                          Default: false

-filename <filename>      Name of the output file.
                          Default: javadoc.xml

Output

Gives a Java class like this:

package com.example;

/**
 * Worlds greeter.
 */
public class HelloWorld {

    /**
     * Greets all worlds.
     *
     * @param worlds list of worlds to greet
     * @return       a greeting to everyone!
     */
    public String hello(List<String> worlds) {
        return "Hello " + worlds.toString();
    }
}

The doclet will generate the following XML document:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<root>
  <package name="com.example">
    <class name="AnnotatedParameter" qualified="com.example.HelloWorld" scope="public" abstract="false" error="false" exception="false" externalizable="false" included="true" serializable="false">
      <comment>Worlds greeter.</comment>
      <class qualified="java.lang.Object"/>
      <constructor name="AnnotatedParameter" signature="()" qualified="com.example.HelloWorld" scope="public" final="false" included="true" native="false" synchronized="false" static="false" varArgs="false"/>
      <method name="hello" signature="(java.util.List&lt;java.lang.String&gt;)" qualified="com.example.HelloWorld.hello" scope="public" abstract="false" final="false" included="true" native="false" synchronized="false" static="false" varArgs="false">
        <comment>Greets all worlds.</comment>
        <tag name="@param" text="worlds list of worlds to greet"/>
        <tag name="@return" text="a greeting to everyone!"/>
        <parameter name="worlds">
          <type qualified="java.util.List">
            <generic qualified="java.lang.String"/>
          </type>
        </parameter>
        <return qualified="java.lang.String"/>
      </method>
    </class>
  </package>
</root>

Credits

Some ideas and name came from Seth Call: (xml-doclet).
Reimplemented by MarkusBernhardt: (xml-doclet).
Ported to the new Javadoc API for Java 11+ by vojtechhabarta: (xml-doclet).
And now maintained by CloudBlue.

License