Get value from node with same name

Question

I'd like to retrieve information from an XML file, however the way it's formatted is pretty strange. Here it is...

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<Careers>
    <CareerList>
        <CareerName></CareerName>
        <CareerDescription></CareerDescription>
    </CareerList>
    <CareerList>
        <CareerName>Cook</CareerName>
        <CareerDescription>Cooks food for people</CareerDescription>
    </CareerList>
</Careers>

I'd like to get the 2nd value, which would be Cook and the description which is Cooks food for people, but instead I'm getting only the empty node. For example...

    public string CareerDescription(string CareerFile)
    {
        XmlDocument xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
        xmlDoc.Load(CareerFile);
        string Description = xmlDoc.SelectSingleNode("Careers/CareerList/CareerDescription").InnerText;
        return Description;
    }

How would I select the second node instead of the first?

have you tried changing ` string Description = xmlDoc.SelectSingleNode("Careers/CareerList/CareerDescription").InnerText;` to something like this `string Description = xmlDoc.SelectSingleNode("/Careers/CareerList/@CareerDescription").value;` and you may go as far to check if not null then skip and or return the non null Description value — MethodMan, May 09 '13 at 20:08
(http://www.kirupa.com/forum/showthread.php?292473-Reading-Child-nodes-from-XML-file-C) — mojtaba, May 09 '13 at 20:11

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered May 09 '13 at 20:07

You can use an index in your XPath expression:

xmlDoc.SelectSingleNode("Careers/CareerList[2]/CareerDescription").InnerText

Personally I'd use LINQ to XML instead, mind you:

var doc = XDocument.Load(CareerFile);
return doc.Root
          .Elements("CareerList")
          .ElementAt(1) // 0-based
          .Element("CareerDescription")
          .Value;

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered May 09 '13 at 20:08

0

Instead of SelectSingleNode you should use SelectNodes: it will return XmlNodeList nodeList. Then you should take the InnerText of the element from that node list with index [1];

public string CareerDescription(string CareerFile)
{
XmlDocument xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
xmlDoc.Load(CareerFile);
string Description = xmlDoc.SelectNodes("Careers/CareerList/CareerDescription")[1].InnerText;
return Description;
}

Refer to the documentation on this method on MSDN for more details: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.xml.xmlnode.selectnodes%28v=vs.71%29.aspx

answered May 09 '13 at 20:08

Alexander Bell

7,842
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The OP only actually wants to select a single node though - so he can index within the XPath expression. As I said in my answer though, I'd prefer to use LINQ to XML :) – Jon Skeet May 09 '13 at 20:15
That's fine! I've provided a bit more universal solution, just in case :-). Voted+ for your solution as well. Rgds, AB – Alexander Bell May 09 '13 at 20:19

jwaliszko · Answer 3 · 2013-05-09T23:29:49.323

0

Just a straight way of LINQ to XML routine (and because it is LINQ, I prefer this way much more than the "standard" usage of XmlDocument with the support of XPath):

return XDocument.Load(CareerFile)
                .Descendants("CareerDescription").Skip(1).First().Value;

edited May 09 '13 at 23:29

answered May 09 '13 at 20:53

jwaliszko

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Get value from node with same name

3 Answers3

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