How to extract tree hierarchy in xml?

[kalos]

Hello!

You know that xml files are hierarchical, ie there is a top level attribute, then sub-attributes are indented and so on.

How can I copy the hierarchy, ie the upper level attributes of a selected attribute/line?

For example:

<a>
    <1>
    <2>
          <x1>
          <x2>

I want to select x2 and copy the hierarchy of it, ie the upper level attributes that x2 belongs to:
<a>
    <2>


Any idea?

Thanks!

[f0dder]

If this is something you're going to need often, you can look into XSLT - it lets you transform XML files in pretty flexibly ways.

It's pretty clunky to work with, though, so if you need a quick solution for a specific problem, there's probably easier ways.

[kalos]

Thanks, as for now, is there an XML reader that can extract the hierarchy tree of a specific line?

[Ath]

is there an XML reader that can extract the hierarchy tree of a specific line?

I use Notepad++ with plug-ins "XML Tools" and "Npp XML Treeview". The XML Tools plug-in has a nice and quick formatting feature (Ctrl-Alt-Shift-B), XPath expression evaluation and it shows the path to the current node when pressing Ctrl-Alt-Shift-P. With the treeview plug-in you can see the structure of the xml nodes (but not the attributes), and quickly select a node.

If that doesn't suffice, there's always XML Copy Editor, an open source specialized XML editor with a lot of features, including XSLT and XPath support. I hardly use it but it does offer some features not easily available in Notepad++ with it's plug-ins.

[wraith808]

You could also use an online one.

https://codebeautify.org/xmlviewer

[Ath]

And if the OP feels really adventurous, he could try to use PowerShell, it seems to handle XML quite nicely, like I found in this ServerFault item, but it helps if you speak XPath, I guess...

You could also use an online one.

https://codebeautify.org/xmlviewer

It doesn't have much of the features the OP asked, though, and I'm a bit worried how/if it will handle a large xml file...

[wraith808]

I've used their JSON viewer on a large file before (7MB+) and it handled it with aplomb.  It doesn't extract the hierarchy, but it does visualize it, so he can know what to copy from the tree.  Just a suggestion.