Develop Reference

Target specific Xml Node in c#

As I said in the Title: I'm trying to delete a specific XML node(in c#).
so I researched and found this:
XmlDocument xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
XmlNode nodeToDelete = xmlDoc.SelectSingleNode("/root/XMLFileName[#ID="+nodeId+"]");
if (nodeToDelete != null)
{
nodeToDelete.ParentNode.RemoveChild(nodeToDelete);
}
xmlDoc.Save("XMLFileName.xml")
I understand here that he's targeting a specific node ( in this case "[#ID ="+nodeId+)
Ok, my question is can I do the same just in the opposite way, by that I mean if its not nodeId then delete it (just like the "!="-Operator in C#).

First of all, the code you posted uses SelectSingleNode which will allways return only one node.
First thing to do : using SelectNodes whose doc is here.
THe result would be :
List<XmlNode> nodes = new List<XmlNode>(
xmlDoc.SelectNodes("//root/XMLFileName[#ID!="+nodeId+"]")
.Cast<XmlNode>());//execute the query and put it into a list
// as my list is strongly typed, I **must** use cast method
// thanks to this list, I can modify the document without changing the
// collection that foreach is traversing
foreach(var nodeToDelete in nodes){
if (nodeToDelete != null)
{
nodeToDelete.ParentNode.RemoveChild(nodeToDelete);
}
}
xmlDoc.Save("XMLFileName.xml")
You can also use a linq query as you are in C# as explained here.

Create loops and parsing XML nodes value for Selenium tests

I am trying to write a test function in C# that read data from an XML file and parse into Selenium testing methods , the XML code is like:
<home>
<ask_frame>
<button>
<id>Object ID<id>
<xpath>Object XPath<xpath>
<textbox>
<id>Object ID<id>
<xpath>Object XPath<xpath>
</ask_frame>
<search_frame>
<id>Object ID<id>
<xpath>Object XPath<xpath>
</search_frame>
<home>
I am trying to create a loop that read the id and xpath value from these nodes and parse them into an method for searching a webpage element by id and xpath. My initial attempt was:
Code updated
public void CheckIdTest()
{
driver.Navigate().GoToUrl(baseURL + "FlightSearch");
XmlDocument xd = new XmlDocument();
xd.Load(#"C:\XMLFile1.xml");
XmlNodeList mainlist = xd.SelectNodes("//home/*");
XmlNode mainroot = mainlist[0];
foreach (XmlNode xnode in mainroot)
{
string objID = xnode.SelectSingleNode("id").InnerText;
string objXPath = xnode.SelectSingleNode("XPath").InnerText;
objID = objID.Trim();
objXPath = objXPath.Trim();
String checkValue = "ObjID value is: " + objID + Environment.NewLine+ "ObjXPath value is: " + objXPath;
System.IO.File.WriteAllText(#"C:\checkvalue.txt", checkValue);
objectCheck(objXPath, objID);
}
}
I have put a String and checked that correct values for ObjID and ObjXPath have been achieved, but this loop also went only twice (checked 2 nodes in first branch). How could I make it runs through every node in my XML?
Any suggestions and explanations to the code will be highly appreciated.

Basically these two lines are using incorrect XPath :
XmlNodeList idlist = xd.SelectNodes("id");
XmlNodeList xpathlist = xd.SelectNodes("XPath");
<id> and <xpath> nodes aren't located directly at the root level, so you can't access it just like above. Besides, xpath is case-sensitive so you should've used "xpath" instead of "XPath". Try to fix it like this :
XmlNodeList idlist = xd.SelectNodes("//id");
XmlNodeList xpathlist = xd.SelectNodes("//xpath");
or more verbose :
XmlNodeList idlist = xd.SelectNodes("home/*/id");
XmlNodeList xpathlist = xd.SelectNodes("home/*/xpath");
UPDATE :
Responding to your comment about looping problem, I think you want to change it like this :
foreach (XmlNode xnode in mainroot.ChildNodes)
{
string objID = xnode.SelectSingleNode("id").InnerText;
string objXPath = pathroot.SelectSingleNode("xpath").InnerText;
objectCheck(objID, objXPath);
}

You are getting this error because you are trying to use an object that is null i.e not instantiated.
Put in a breakpoint at the line
XmlDocument xd = new XmlDocument();
and step through line by line till you find where the nothing.null reference is.
It should not take long to find out what the problem is.

XPathSelectElements returns null

Load function is already defined in xmlData class
public class XmlData
{
public void Load(XElement xDoc)
{
var id = xDoc.XPathSelectElements("//ID");
var listIds = xDoc.XPathSelectElements("/Lists//List/ListIDS/ListIDS");
}
}
I'm just calling the Load function from my end.
XmlData aXmlData = new XmlData();
string input, stringXML = "";
TextReader aTextReader = new StreamReader("D:\\test.xml");
while ((input = aTextReader.ReadLine()) != null)
{
stringXML += input;
}
XElement Content = XElement.Parse(stringXML);
aXmlData.Load(Content);
in load function,im getting both id and and listIds as null.
My test.xml contains
<SEARCH>
<ID>11242</ID>
<Lists>
<List CURRENT="true" AGGREGATEDCHANGED="false">
<ListIDS>
<ListID>100567</ListID>
<ListID>100564</ListID>
<ListID>100025</ListID>
<ListID>2</ListID>
<ListID>1</ListID>
</ListIDS>
</List>
</Lists>
</SEARCH>

EDIT: Your sample XML doesn't have an id element in the namespace with the nss alias. It would be <nss:id> in that case, or there'd be a default namespace set up. I've assumed for this answer that in reality the element you're looking for is in the namespace.
Your query is trying to find an element called id at the root level. To find all id elements, you need:
var tempId = xDoc.XPathSelectElements("//nss:id", ns);
... although personally I'd use:
XDocument doc = XDocument.Parse(...);
XNamespace nss = "http://schemas.microsoft.com/SQLServer/reporting/reportdesigner";
// Or use FirstOrDefault(), or whatever...
XElement idElement = doc.Descendants(nss + "id").Single();
(I prefer using the query methods on LINQ to XML types instead of XPath... I find it easier to avoid silly syntax errors etc.)
Your sample code is also unclear as you're using xDoc which hasn't been declared... it helps to write complete examples, ideally including everything required to compile and run as a console app.

I am looking at the question 3 hours after it was submitted and 41 minutes after it was (last) edited.
There are no namespaces defined in the provided XML document.
var listIds = xDoc.XPathSelectElements("/Lists//List/ListIDS/ListIDS");
This XPath expression obviously doesn't select any node from the provided XML document, because the XML document doesn't have a top element named Lists (the name of the actual top element is SEARCH)
var id = xDoc.XPathSelectElements("//ID");
in load function,im getting both id and and listIds as null.
This statement is false, because //ID selects the only element named ID in the provided XML document, thus the value of the C# variable id is non-null. Probably you didn't test thoroughly after editing the XML document.
Most probably the original ID element belonged to some namespace. But now it is in "no namespace" and the XPath expression above does select it.

string xmldocument = "<response xmlns:nss=\"http://schemas.microsoft.com/SQLServer/reporting/reportdesigner\"><action>test</action><id>1</id></response>";
XElement Content = XElement.Parse(xmldocument);
XPathNavigator navigator = Content.CreateNavigator();
XmlNamespaceManager ns = new XmlNamespaceManager(navigator.NameTable);
ns.AddNamespace("nss", "http://schemas.microsoft.com/SQLServer/reporting/reportdesigner");
var tempId = navigator.SelectSingleNode("/id");

The reason for the null value or system returned value is due to the following
var id = xDoc.XPathSelectElements("//ID");
XpathSElectElements is System.xml.linq.XElment which is linq queried date. It cannot be directly outputed as such.
To Get individual first match element
use XPathSelectElement("//ID");
You can check the number of occurrences using XPathSelectElements as
var count=xDoc.XPathSelectElements("//ID").count();
you can also query the linq statement as order by using specific conditions
Inorder to get node value from a list u can use this
foreach (XmlNode xNode in xDoc.SelectNodes("//ListIDS/ListID"))
{
Console.WriteLine(xNode.InnerText);
}
For Second list you havnt got the value since, the XPath for list items is not correct

Direct access and edit to an xml node, using properties

El Padrino showed a solution:
How to change XML Attribute
where an xml element can be loaded directly (no for each..), edited and saved!
My xml is:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-8"?>
<g>
<page no="1" href="page1.xml" title="נושא 1">
<row>
<pic pos="1" src="D:\RuthSiteFiles\webSiteGalleryClone\ruthCompPics\C_WebBigPictures\100CANON\IMG_0418.jpg" width="150" height="120">1</pic>
</row>
</page>
</g>
and I need to select a node by two attributes(1. "no" in the page tag and "pos" in the pic tag)
I've found :
How to access a xml node with attributes and namespace using selectsinglenode()
where direct access is possible but beside the fact that I dont understand the solution, I think it uses the xpath object which can't be modified and save changes.
What's the best way to
access directly an xml node (I'm responsible that the node will be unique)
edit that node
save changes to the xml
Thanks
Asaf

You can use the same pattern as the first answer you linked to, but you will need to include the conditions on the attributes in the XPath. Your basic XPath would be g/page/row/pic. Since you want the no attribute of page to be 1, you add [#no='1'] as a predicate on page. So, the full XPath query is something like g/page[#no='1']/row/pic[#pos='1']. SelectSingleNode will return a mutable XmlNode object, so you can modify that object and save the original document to save changes.
Putting the XPath together with El Padrino's answer:
//Here is the variable with which you assign a new value to the attribute
string newValue = string.Empty;
XmlDocument xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
xmlDoc.Load(xmlFile);
XmlNode node = xmlDoc.SelectSingleNode("g/page[#no='1']/row/pic[#pos='1']");
node.Attributes["src"].Value = newValue;
xmlDoc.Save(xmlFile);
//xmlFile is the path of your file to be modified

Use the new, well-designed XDocument/XElement instead of the old XmlDocument API.
In your example,
XDocument doc = XDocument.Load(filename);
var pages = doc.Root.Elements("page").Where(page => (int?) page.Attribute("no") == 1);
var rows = pages.SelectMany(page => page.Elements("row"));
var pics = rows.SelectMany(row => row.Elements("pic").Where(pic => (int?) pic.Attribute("pos") == 1));
foreach (var pic in pics)
{
// outputs <pic pos="1" src="D:\RuthSiteFiles\webSiteGalleryClone\ruthCompPics\C_WebBigPictures\100CANON\IMG_0418.jpg" width="150" height="120">1</pic>
Console.WriteLine(pic);
// outputs 1
Console.WriteLine(pic.Value);
// Changes the value
pic.Value = 2;
}
doc.Save(filename);

xmldoc.Childnodes.item() question

I decided to try out the tutorial on this website
http://www.csharphelp.com/2006/05/creating-a-xml-document-with-c/
Here's my code, which is more or less the same but a bit easier to read
using System;
using System.Xml;
public class Mainclass
{
public static void Main()
{
XmlDocument XmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
XmlDocument xmldoc;
XmlNode node1;
node1 = XmlDoc.CreateNode(XmlNodeType.XmlDeclaration, "", "");
XmlDoc.AppendChild(node1);
XmlElement element1;
element1 = XmlDoc.CreateElement("", "ROOT", "");
XmlText text1;
text1 = XmlDoc.CreateTextNode("this is the text of the root element");
element1.AppendChild(text1);
// appends the text specified above to the element1
XmlDoc.AppendChild(element1);
// another element
XmlElement element2;
element2 = XmlDoc.CreateElement("", "AnotherElement", "");
XmlText text2;
text2 = XmlDoc.CreateTextNode("This is the text of this element");
element2.AppendChild(text2);
XmlDoc.ChildNodes.Item(1).AppendChild(element2);
}
}
So far, I'm liking XmlDocument, but I can't figure out how this line works
XmlDoc.ChildNodes.Item(1).AppendChild(element2);
Specifically, the Item() part of it
according to MSDN...
//
// Summary:
// Retrieves a node at the given index.
//
// Parameters:
// index:
// Zero-based index into the list of nodes.
//
// Returns:
// The System.Xml.XmlNode in the collection. If index is greater than or equal
// to the number of nodes in the list, this returns null.
However, I'm still not really sure what "index" refers to, or what Item() does. Does it move down the tree or down a branch?
Also, when I was looking at it, I thought it would end up like this
what I thought would happen:
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<ROOT>this is the text of the root element</ROOT>
<AnotherElement>This is the text of this element</AnotherElement>
but it ended up like this
Actual output
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<ROOT>this is the text of the root element
<AnotherElement>This is the text of this element</AnotherElement>
</ROOT>
(formatting added)

The ChildNodes property returns the XmlNodeList of immediate children of what you call it on. Item then finds the nth member of that list. It won't recurse into grand-children etc. In particular, I believe in this case Item(0) would return the XML declaration, and Item(1) returns the root element. A nicer way of expressing "get to the root element" would be to use XmlDocument.DocumentElement.
Note that your "expected" output wouldn't even be valid XML - an XML document can only have one root element.
To be honest, this isn't a terribly nice use of it - and in particular I would recommend using LINQ to XML rather than XmlDocument if you possibly can. It's not particularly clear what you're trying to achieve with the code you've given, but it would almost certainly be much simpler in LINQ to XML.