Parsing nested xml with lxml and Python

Question

I am having trouble parsing XML when it is in the form of:

<Cars>
    <Car>
        <Color>Blue</Color>
        <Make>Ford</Make>
        <Model>Mustant</Model>
    </Car>
    <Car>
        <Color>Red</Color>
        <Make>Chevy</Make>
        <Model>Camaro</Model>
    </Car>
</Cars>

I have figured out how to parse 1st level children like this:

<Car>
    <Color>Blue</Color>
    <Make>Chevy</Make>
    <Model>Camaro</Model>
</Car>

With this kind of code:

from lxml import etree
    a = os.path.join(localPath,file)
    element = etree.parse(a)
    cars = element.xpath('//Root/Foo/Bar/Car/node()[text()]')
    parsedCars = [{field.tag: field.text for field in cars} for action in cars]
    print parsedCars[0]['Make'] #Chevy

How can I parse our multiple "Car" tags that is a child tag of "Cars"?

Kien Truong · Accepted Answer · 2012-03-08 13:32:40Z

3

Try this

from lxml import etree
    a = os.path.join(localPath,file)
    element = etree.parse(a)
    cars = element.xpath('//Root/Foo/Bar/Car')
    for car in cars:
        colors = car.xpath('./Color')
        makes = car.xpath('./Make')
        models = car.xpath('./Model')

answered Mar 8, 2012 at 13:32

Kien Truong

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4 Comments

lodkkx Over a year ago

When I run this code to find Color I get the address and not the actual object. For example, when trying to find color I get [<Element Color at 0x2a9f0f8>]

Kien Truong Over a year ago

They return the element object. To get the text use the xpath './Color/text()'

lodkkx Over a year ago

Yea I actually figured it out - but used './Color/node()' instead. What is the different between the two - they both give me the text.

Kien Truong Over a year ago

node() select all node, text() select only text node. In this instance, there are only text nodes so they perform the same.

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