PHP variables added to XML

Basically i have a XML file which i read from for e.g.

Code:

---

<person>
      <firstName> tom</firstName>
</person>

---

now is it possible to make the first name data read from a php variable say for e.g.

PHP Code:

---

$firstname = "tom"; 


---

Code:

---

<person>
      <firstName> tom</firstName>
                      // so variable <firstName> is always saved as childNodes [i][0]
</person>

---

Is this possible :S?

<?php
$file = file_get_contents( "xmlfile.xml" );
$file = explode( "<firstName>" , $file);
echo $file[0];
?>

yeah i know how to retrieve data from a XML file, but what i want is to write data into the XML file but storing it as a php variable rather than a XML variable.

Like say i have in my php page a variable named $name i want to be able to put whatever is stored in that PHP variable into the XML file.

fwrite?

yeah but how would i be able to write in a specific place in the XML file without deleting what already in there?

find 'tom', replace it with 'god'...

Do this..

PHP Code:

---

<?php

$name = "Caleb";

$xml .= "<blah>";
$xml .= "<name>" . $name . "</name>";
$xml .= "</blah>";

header("Content-type: text/xml");

echo $xml;

?>

---

Then just use mod_rewrite to rewrite that to blah.xml or something.

PHP Code:

---

<?php

$exampleXML = '    <persons>
                    <dude>James</dude>
                    <dude>Celeb</dude>
                    <dude>Mark</dude>
                    <dude>God</dude>
                </persons>';

$xmlExplode = explode( '<persons>', $exampleXML );
$xmlPersons = str_replace( '</persons>', '', $xmlExplode[ 1 ] );

$xmlExplode = explode( '<dude>', $xmlPersons );


$xmlCeleb = str_replace( '</dude>', '', $xmlExplode[ 2 ] );
$xmlJames = str_replace( '</dude>', '', $xmlExplode[ 1 ] );

echo( $xmlCeleb );

?>

---

Something maybe around that?

Why not just use SimpleXML? :P

I was gonna recommend SimpleXML aswel.

Thanks worked :)