Python - replace root element of one xml file with another root element without its children

Question

I have one xml file that looks like this, XML1:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<report>
</report>

And the other one that is like this, XML2:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<report attrib1="blabla" attrib2="blabla" attrib3="blabla" attrib4="blabla" attrib5="blabla" >
    <child1>  
        <child2> 
            ....
        </child2>
    </child1>
</report>

I need to replace and put root element of XML2 without its children, so XML1 looks like this:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<report attrib1="blabla" attrib2="blabla" attrib3="blabla" attrib4="blabla" attrib5="blabla">
</report>

Currently my code looks like this but it won't remove children but put whole tree inside:

source_tree = ET.parse('XML2.xml')
source_root = source_tree.getroot()

report = source_root.findall('report') 

for child in list(report):
     report.remove(child)
     source_tree.write('XML1.xml', encoding='utf-8', xml_declaration=True)

Anyone has ide how can I achieve this?

Thanks!

Does this answer your question? XML: remove child node of a node — Mahrkeenerh
– Mahrkeenerh, Commented Oct 7, 2021 at 8:29
Unfortunately noup, because here he knows what are tags of children, but in my case they are changing, so this second iteration bars = foo.findall('bar') won't work in my situation — John
– John, Commented Oct 7, 2021 at 8:36
You just need to copy the attrib from 2 to 1. See my answer. — balderman
– balderman, Commented Oct 7, 2021 at 8:38
recursively iterate over xml: stackoverflow.com/questions/21074361/… — Mahrkeenerh
– Mahrkeenerh, Commented Oct 7, 2021 at 8:38

balderman · Accepted Answer · 2021-10-07 08:37:19Z

1

Try the below (just copy attrib)

import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET


xml1 = '''<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<report>
</report>'''

xml2 = '''<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<report attrib1="blabla" attrib2="blabla" attrib3="blabla" attrib4="blabla" attrib5="blabla" >
    <child1>  
        <child2> 
        </child2>
    </child1>
</report>'''

root1 = ET.fromstring(xml1)
root2 = ET.fromstring(xml2)

root1.attrib = root2.attrib

ET.dump(root1)

output

<report attrib1="blabla" attrib2="blabla" attrib3="blabla" attrib4="blabla" attrib5="blabla">
</report>

answered Oct 7, 2021 at 8:37

balderman

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7 Comments

John Over a year ago

It's a such a fine solution, but I keep getting: ParseError not well-formed (invalid token): line 1, column 2

balderman Over a year ago

If you copy & paste my solution - do you get any error? Please explain what you do.

John Over a year ago

I just put root1 = ET.fromstring(xml1) and replace xml1 with whole path to the file like this ('C:/myPc/blabla/xml1.xml') and get error on that line

John Over a year ago

now I have managed to get it running, but attribute value is only printed in my console, not actually copied in file

Olvin Roght Over a year ago

@John, to save edited XML to file you need .... to save XML to file. root.write()

|

John · Accepted Answer · 2021-10-07 09:05:18Z

0

So here is working code:

source_tree = ET.parse('XML2.xml')
source_root = source_tree.getroot()

dest_tree = ET.parse('XML1.xml')
dest_root = dest_tree.getroot()

dest_root.attrib = source_root.attrib
dest_tree.write('XML1.xml', encoding='utf-8', xml_declaration=True)

edited Oct 7, 2021 at 9:05

answered Oct 7, 2021 at 9:00

John

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