Reading XML in 1 line.

[Denny Lam]

The XML I have is same as web.config where data do not repeat. I want a very handy method to pull data out of the xml.

What I want is ex:

1. Response.Write( Xml("\\Roots\No de\Element"))

2. <% Xml("\\Roots\No de\Element") %>

I've gone through many example with XMLReader, Xnode, etc.. but they all involve looping over the xml which I don't want. I want to point it directly to the Element and it'll return it's value.

Is there any build tool I can use to read XML in 1 line?
How can I read xml in the minimum amount of code?

[Subin Ninan]

Simplest way to deal with xml files is using dataset.

[Denny Lam]

I want to avoid using collections. All I want to do is to pull a simple value out from the xml.

Thanks

[Denny Lam]

I guess you're right.
I wanted to find a build-in method and avoid loading it to memory but DataSet is not that bad.
Thanks

ex: xmlFile "XMLFile1.x ml"
xmlPath "/books/book/Author"

XML:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<books>
<book>
<Author>AuthorT xt</Author>
</book>
</books>

protected string getXmlValue(string xmlFile, string xmlPath)
        {            
            XmlDocument doc = new XmlDocument();
            doc.Load(Server.MapPath(xmlFile));

            XmlNode node;
            XmlElement root = doc.DocumentElement;
            node = root.SelectSingleNode(xmlPath);                        
            return (node == null)? "Not found" : node.InnerText;
        }

[Nikola Djokic]

For reading XML node, and it's value the best answer is to use XMLPaht:

XDocument xDoc = XDocument.Parse(xml);
      var elem = (from xElem in xDoc.Root.Elements()
                  where xElem.Name == "DemoXML"
                  select xElem).First();
 
      // The best!!!
      // MSDN recommended
      // using System.Xml.XPath;
      var res1 = xDoc.Root.XPathSelectElement("MyData/Name");
      if (res1 != null)
      {
        res1.Value = "NewValue";
      }

I hope this helped you!

[Denny Lam]

Can you please explain how to use Linq?

XML:
<books>
<book>
<Author>AuthorT xt</Author>
<Title>TitleTxt </Title>
</book>
</books>

When I try using your LINQ to look for book it works but when I try to look for Author it crashes.