What are the best practices for handling XML manipulation in PHP, specifically when it comes to renaming elements?

When renaming elements in XML using PHP, the best practice is to use the DOMDocument class to load the XML, locate the elements to be renamed, create new elements with the desired names, and then replace the old elements with the new ones. This approach ensures that the XML structure remains valid and that any associated attributes or child elements are preserved during the renaming process. 

$xmlString = '<root><oldElement>Content</oldElement></root>';

$dom = new DOMDocument();
$dom->loadXML($xmlString);

$oldElement = $dom->getElementsByTagName('oldElement')->item(0);
$newElement = $dom->createElement('newElement', $oldElement->nodeValue);

$oldElement->parentNode->replaceChild($newElement, $oldElement);

$newXmlString = $dom->saveXML();
echo $newXmlString;

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