What is an ExpatError?
python, xml
Solution
Summing up and expanding on the comments to the question:
`ExpatError` is the type of exception raised when expat reports an error. expat is the Python Standard Library's XML parsing module.
`minidom`, Python's minimal implementation of the Document Object Model interface, uses expat internally to parse the XML input when `minidom.parseString()` is called.
The typo in the input XML left it with a `<pesron>` tag that is not closed, triggering expat to indicate this by throwing the `ExpatError`.
As to the origin of the name expat, rather than being a reference to "expatriate" in English, it is a shortened version of the module's description: (E)Xml PArser Toolkit.
Problem
I've been playing around with parsing XML with Python, and I've found that making a spelling mistake in my XML tags raises an `ExpatError`. Since I don't think my code is residing in a foreign country, to what does an `ExpatError` refer, in general? Misspelled Code: ``` minidom.parseString("<people><pesron>Dan</person><person>John</person></people>") ``` Results In: ``` ExpatError Traceback (most recent call last) <ipython-input-5-9c00296c48cb> in <module>() ----> 1 minidom.parseString("<people><pesron>Dan</person><person>John</person></people>") /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/7.3/lib/python2.7/xml/dom/minidom.pyc in parseString(string, parser) 1928 if parser is None: 1929 from xml.dom import expatbuilder -> 1930 return expatbuilder.parseString(string) 1931 else: 1932 from xml.dom import pulldom /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/7.3/lib/python2.7/xml/dom/expatbuilder.pyc in parseString(string, namespaces) 938 else: 939 builder = ExpatBuilder() --> 940 return builder.parseString(string) 941 942 /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/7.3/lib/python2.7/xml/dom/expatbuilder.pyc in parseString(self, string) 221 parser = self.getParser() 222 try: --> 223 parser.Parse(string, True) 224 self._setup_subset(string) 225 except ParseEscape: ExpatError: mismatched tag: line 1, column 21 ```