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HTML API: Ensure carriage returns are serialized in HTML#12466

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sirreal wants to merge 42 commits into
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sirreal:html-api-fuzz-fiz/decoded-cr
Draft

HTML API: Ensure carriage returns are serialized in HTML#12466
sirreal wants to merge 42 commits into
WordPress:trunkfrom
sirreal:html-api-fuzz-fiz/decoded-cr

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@sirreal

@sirreal sirreal commented Jul 9, 2026

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Summary

  • Serialize decoded carriage returns in text, attributes, and RCDATA-style contents as 
 so normalization reaches a fixed point.
  • Relies on r62667.

Testing

  • Regression coverage for decoded CR handling across text, attributes, RCDATA, tables, and templates.
  • HTML API and html5lib PHPUnit groups and PHPCS pass.

Trac ticket: https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/65372

Use of AI Tools

AI assistance: Yes
Tool(s): Codex
Model(s): GPT-5.5
Used for: PR description cleanup and code review.


This Pull Request is for code review only. Please keep all other discussion in the Trac ticket. Do not merge this Pull Request. See GitHub Pull Requests for Code Review in the Core Handbook for more details.

sirreal added 30 commits June 11, 2026 18:29
Red TDD step: browser-verified expectations for raw CR/CRLF/NUL in
attribute values; passing pins for encoded 
/� and for verbatim
pass-through of API-supplied values.

See #65372.
Attribute values read from the input document now normalize newlines
(CRLF/CR to LF) and replace U+0000 NULL bytes with U+FFFD before
decoding character references, matching what browsers produce for the
same markup. Values enqueued through set_attribute() are plaintext API
values and continue to pass through unchanged.

See #65372.
Red TDD step: flushing add_class()/remove_class() updates must read the
existing class attribute through the same input preprocessing as
get_attribute(), normalizing newlines and replacing NULL bytes.

See #65372.
class_name_updates_to_attributes_updates() reads the existing class
value through the same preprocessing helper as get_attribute(), so
add_class()/remove_class() no longer rebuild the attribute from raw
source bytes containing CR or NULL.

See #65372.
Red TDD step: browser-verified expectations that attribute names are
exposed and addressed with U+FFFD replacing NULL bytes, that names
collapsing after replacement behave as duplicates of one attribute,
and that attribute updates target the replaced name.

See #65372.
Attribute lookup keys are normalized where they are created, in
parse_next_attribute(): NULL bytes are replaced with U+FFFD before
lowercasing, as the tokenizer does in browsers. Names which collapse
to the same replaced name are duplicates of one attribute (first one
wins), lookups by the raw NULL spelling no longer match, and updates
or removals by the replaced name target the source attribute. Raw
document spans are untouched.

See #65372.
Red TDD step: tag names are exposed with U+FFFD replacing NULL bytes;
passing pins confirm NULL bytes never select rawtext parsing and never
appear in PI-lookalike comment tag names.

See #65372.
get_tag() (and get_token_name(), which delegates to it) returns tag
names with U+0000 NULL bytes replaced by U+FFFD, as the tokenizer does
in browsers. Internal token identification continues to compare raw
bytes: a NULL byte in a tag name already prevents rawtext detection,
matching browsers, where the replaced name likewise never equals
SCRIPT or the other special names.

See #65372.
Red TDD step: browser-verified expectation that classList-equivalent
reads preserve NULL bytes in values set through the API; the U+0000
replacement belongs to the tokenizer, and document-sourced values
already receive it in get_attribute().

See #65372.
class_list() received its NULL-byte replacement when reading raw class
values; that replacement now happens in get_attribute() for values
from the input document. Performing it on API-supplied values diverged
from browsers, where classList preserves NULL bytes in values set via
setAttribute().

See #65372.
Benchmark-guided: reading an attribute value applies up to three
str_replace passes which doubled read cost for long values containing
no bytes needing replacement. Guarding with strpos keeps the common
case at two fast scans; values are typically free of CR and NULL.

Benchmark (PHP 8.4, medians of 3): scanning 100-tag documents reading
3 attributes each, 2000 iterations: trunk 667ms, unguarded 714ms,
guarded 699ms. Reading a 10.8KB clean attribute value 200k times:
trunk 147ms, unguarded 313ms, guarded 258ms. The remaining cost is
the unavoidable byte inspection.

See #65372.
Red TDD step from adversarial review: a named character reference
without a terminating semicolon must decode when followed by a NULL
byte or any non-ASCII byte. Replacing NULL with U+FFFD before decoding
fed the decoder a multi-byte follower whose classification by
ctype_alnum() depends on the process locale, suppressing valid decodes
in attribute values, diverging from browsers and from trunk.

See #65372.
The tokenizer replaces U+0000 NULL bytes as it consumes input, so a
character reference without a terminating semicolon sees the raw NULL
byte as its follower, which is unambiguous, and the reference decodes.
Replacing before decoding handed the decoder U+FFFD's lead byte, whose
ctype_alnum() classification depends on the process locale, wrongly
suppressing the decode under UTF-8 locales. No character reference
decodes into NULL, so replacing after decoding is equivalent for the
value's own bytes and faithful to the tokenizer's order.

See #65372.
Per the named-character-reference state, a semicolon-less reference is
ambiguous only when followed by an ASCII alphanumeric or equals sign.
ctype_alnum() classifies bytes 0x80 and above as alphanumeric under
UTF-8 locales, wrongly suppressing decodes followed by any non-ASCII
byte and making decoding depend on the process locale.

See #65372.
Red TDD step from adversarial review: next_tag() must match tag names
in the same U+FFFD-replaced alphabet that get_tag() exposes, so the
getter round-trips into queries, raw NULL spellings match nothing, and
the Tag Processor agrees with the HTML Processor, whose queries
already compare against the replaced token name.

See #65372.
next_tag() compared sought tag names against raw document bytes while
get_tag() returns names with NULL bytes replaced by U+FFFD, breaking
the getter-to-query round trip and disagreeing with the HTML
Processor's queries. Matching now happens in the exposed alphabet; the
existing byte comparison is unchanged for names without NULL bytes, so
the hot path costs the same.

See #65372.
Red TDD step from adversarial review: get_attribute( 'CLASS' )
returned a stale value when class updates were pending, because the
flush guard compared the attribute name case-sensitively.

See #65372.
Attribute lookups are ASCII-case-insensitive, but the pending-class
flush in get_attribute() compared the requested name case-sensitively,
returning a stale value for spellings like "CLASS".

See #65372.
From adversarial review: pins for class helpers over replaced source
values, boolean attributes with NULL-byte names, verbatim prefix
matching in get_attribute_names_with_prefix(), and HTML Processor
end-tag matching across NULL and U+FFFD spellings (browser-verified:
both spellings tokenize to the same name). Documents the @SInCE 7.1.0
behavior on indirectly-affected getters and the known asymmetry of
set_modifiable_text(), whose value reads back normalized unlike
attribute values, which round-trip verbatim.

See #65372.
Red TDD step: decoded carriage returns in text and attribute values
must serialize as 
 so that normalized output is idempotent: a
raw CR in serialized output would be normalized to a line feed when
parsed again. The raw-CR attribute and class-update cases pass already
through the preprocessing-correct getters and pin that behavior.

See #65372.
The serializer emitted decoded carriage returns raw into text and
attribute values, where input preprocessing turns them into line feeds
on the next parse: normalized output never reached a fixed point for
documents containing 
. Escaping CR after htmlspecialchars() keeps
the character through parse/serialize round trips. Attribute values
read through get_attribute(), whose input preprocessing guarantees raw
source carriage returns already arrive normalized to line feeds, so
only genuinely decoded CRs are escaped.

See #65372.
An attribute value set through set_attribute() may contain NULL bytes;
serializing them as U+FFFD keeps normalized output idempotent, where
browsers' innerHTML emits the raw byte and loses it to replacement on
the next parse. This pins the behavior ahead of consolidating the
serializer's NULL handling.

See #65372.
The getters now expose tag and attribute names with NULL bytes already
replaced by U+FFFD, leaving the serializer's name scrubbing dead, and
the only live input to the per-attribute whole-buffer scrub was an
API-supplied attribute value. That replacement moves into
serialize_decoded_text() next to the carriage-return escaping, which
exists for the same reason: emitting bytes the next parse would
transform. UTF-8 scrubbing of qualified names remains, as invalid
sequences can still reach serialization through source names.

See #65372.
From adversarial review: pins that SCRIPT and STYLE contents serialize
without escaping, where character references do not decode, and that
serialize_token() output for modified class and NULL-containing
attribute values parses back to the same decoded values.

See #65372.
@sirreal sirreal changed the title Html api fuzz fiz/decoded cr HTML API: Correctly serialize carriage returns in HTML Jul 9, 2026
@sirreal sirreal changed the title HTML API: Correctly serialize carriage returns in HTML HTML API: Ensure carriage returns are serialized in HTML Jul 9, 2026
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github-actions Bot commented Jul 9, 2026

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Comment on lines +1414 to 1416
$tag_name = $this->get_tag();
$in_html = 'html' === $this->get_namespace();
$qualified_name = $in_html ? strtolower( $tag_name ) : $this->get_qualified_tag_name();

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These are already handled since r62667:

$tag_name = str_replace( "\x00", "\u{FFFD}", substr( $this->html, $this->tag_name_starts_at, $this->tag_name_length ) );

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