diff --git a/activesupport/CHANGELOG b/activesupport/CHANGELOG
index 98cc8a16354e0dd3c0a38b5a0b67b4261214f316..15974628bbb4d656de30a90ec5a0e84f0ee4474e 100644
--- a/activesupport/CHANGELOG
+++ b/activesupport/CHANGELOG
@@ -1,5 +1,7 @@
 *SVN*
 
+* update XmlSimple to 1.0.10. Closes #6532. [nicksieger]
+
 * Update dependencies to allow constants to be defined alongside their siblings. A common case for this is AR model classes with STI; user.rb might define User, Administrator and Guest for example. [Nicholas Seckar]
 
 * next_week respects DST changes.  #6483, #5617, #2353, #2509, #4551 [marclove, rabiedenharn, rails@roetzel.de, jsolson@damogran.org, drbrain@segment7.net]
diff --git a/activesupport/lib/active_support/vendor/xml_simple.rb b/activesupport/lib/active_support/vendor/xml_simple.rb
index e6ce63a83963161f2110491ade17fc666fd18e4e..ec07966ff989dc37be88dbca094cf6c1674a4785 100644
--- a/activesupport/lib/active_support/vendor/xml_simple.rb
+++ b/activesupport/lib/active_support/vendor/xml_simple.rb
@@ -1,20 +1,21 @@
 # = XmlSimple
 #
 # Author::    Maik Schmidt <contact@maik-schmidt.de>
-# Copyright:: Copyright (c) 2003 Maik Schmidt
+# Copyright:: Copyright (c) 2003-2006 Maik Schmidt
 # License::   Distributes under the same terms as Ruby.
 #
 require 'rexml/document'
+require 'stringio'
 
 # Easy API to maintain XML (especially configuration files).
-class XmlSimple #:nodoc:
+class XmlSimple
   include REXML
 
-  @@VERSION = '1.0.2'
+  @@VERSION = '1.0.9'
 
   # A simple cache for XML documents that were already transformed
   # by xml_in.
-  class Cache #:nodoc:
+  class Cache
     # Creates and initializes a new Cache object.
     def initialize
       @mem_share_cache = {}
@@ -184,7 +185,7 @@ def xml_in(string = nil, options = nil)
         
         @doc = load_xml_file(filename)
       end
-    elsif string.kind_of?(IO)
+    elsif string.kind_of?(IO) || string.kind_of?(StringIO)
       @doc = parse(string.readlines.to_s)
     else
       raise ArgumentError, "Could not parse object of type: <#{string.type}>."
@@ -266,7 +267,7 @@ def XmlSimple.xml_out(hash, options = nil)
       keyattr keeproot forcecontent contentkey noattr
       searchpath forcearray suppressempty anonymoustag
       cache grouptags normalisespace normalizespace
-      variables varattr
+      variables varattr keytosymbol
     ),
     'out' => %w(
       keyattr keeproot contentkey noattr rootname
@@ -283,6 +284,7 @@ def XmlSimple.xml_out(hash, options = nil)
   DEF_ANONYMOUS_TAG   = 'anon'
   DEF_FORCE_ARRAY     = true
   DEF_INDENTATION     = '  '
+  DEF_KEY_TO_SYMBOL   = false
   
   # Normalizes option names in a hash, i.e., turns all
   # characters to lower case and removes all underscores.
@@ -350,6 +352,8 @@ def handle_options(direction, options)
       @options['xmldeclaration'] = DEF_XML_DECLARATION
     end
 
+    @options['keytosymbol'] = DEF_KEY_TO_SYMBOL unless @options.has_key?('keytosymbol')
+
     if @options.has_key?('contentkey')
       if @options['contentkey'] =~ /^-(.*)$/
         @options['contentkey']    = $1
@@ -654,6 +658,14 @@ def merge(hash, key, value)
         end
       end
     end
+    
+    #patch for converting keys to symbols
+    if @options.has_key?('keytosymbol')
+      if @options['keytosymbol'] == true
+        key = key.to_s.downcase.to_sym
+      end
+    end
+    
     if hash.has_key?(key)
       if hash[key].instance_of?(Array)
         hash[key] << value
@@ -879,14 +891,7 @@ def hash_to_array(parent, hashref)
   # data::
   #   The string to be escaped.
   def escape_value(data)
-    return data if data.nil? || data == ''
-    result = data.dup
-    result.gsub!('&', '&amp;')
-    result.gsub!('<', '&lt;')
-    result.gsub!('>', '&gt;')
-    result.gsub!('"', '&quot;')
-    result.gsub!("'", '&apos;')
-    result
+    Text::normalize(data)
   end
   
   # Removes leading and trailing whitespace and sequences of
@@ -895,10 +900,7 @@ def escape_value(data)
   # text::
   #   String to be normalised.
   def normalise_space(text)
-    text.sub!(/^\s+/, '')
-    text.sub!(/\s+$/, '')
-    text.gsub!(/\s\s+/, ' ')
-    text
+    text.strip.gsub(/\s\s+/, ' ')
   end
 
   # Checks, if an object is nil, an empty String or an empty Hash.
@@ -926,14 +928,14 @@ def empty(value)
   # default::
   #   Value to be returned, if node could not be converted.
   def node_to_text(node, default = nil)
-    if node.instance_of?(Element) 
-      return node.texts.join('')
-    elsif node.instance_of?(Attribute)
-      return node.value.nil? ? default : node.value.strip
-    elsif node.instance_of?(Text)
-      return node.to_s.strip
+    if node.instance_of?(REXML::Element) 
+      node.texts.map { |t| t.value }.join('')
+    elsif node.instance_of?(REXML::Attribute)
+      node.value.nil? ? default : node.value.strip
+    elsif node.instance_of?(REXML::Text)
+      node.value.strip
     else
-      return default
+      default
     end
   end