All available xpath in XML document

[oscar2]

I am using vb.net 2010 to get data from XML file, I was wondering if there is any way to find and print all available xpath of all nodes in the document. For example:
XML file is like :

<CATALOG>
  <CD>
    <TITLE>Empire Burlesque</TITLE>
    <ARTIST>Bob Dylan</ARTIST>
  </CD>
  <CD>
    <TITLE>Hide your heart</TITLE>
    <ARTIST>Bonnie Tyler</ARTIST>
  </CD>

The result should be something like :

/CATALOG
/CATALOG/CD
/CATALOG/CD/TITLE
/CATALOG/CD/ARTIST

I hope I'm clear enough..

[Dormilich]

I was wondering if there is any way to find and print all available xpath of all nodes in the document.

there’s more than just those 4 XPaths. you can have relative XPaths, you can have XPaths with conditions, with selectors, etc. etc.

what you possibly mean is a document tree representation.

[oscar2]

In fact I need those 4 paths and of course if there is another node inside say TITLE I need a path to that node as well. All paths should start from the Root node CATALOG in this case. It might be worth mentioning that I will then feed those paths to a list to give the user an easy way to select the node or node-set to be modified.
Thanks :)

[jkmyoung]

I've done this with xslt before; it's possible to do it with other languages as well. It's recursion; Pseudocode:

Start at document level. 
call f(rootnode, "")


f(Node n, String s){
  For each child node of n {
    path = s + \ + node name
    print path
    child.f(n, path)
  }
}

[oscar2]

Thanks I am working on something similar.. will post here if I get the same result with VB.net
Thanks again

[oscar2]

I am working with this right now, This recursive sub can easily find path of all children but it will miss any sibling!

Public Class Form1
    Public path As String

    Private Sub cmdRun_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles cmdRun.Click
        Dim xDoc As XmlDocument = New XmlDocument
        xDoc.Load("C:\Temp\file.xml")
        Dim node As XmlNode = xDoc.SelectSingleNode("/catalog")
        path = node.Name
        GetPath(node)
    End Sub

    Private Sub GetPath(ByVal node As XmlNode)
        lst.Items.Add(path)

        If node.HasChildNodes = True Then  ' <==> If Not node.NodeType = XmlNodeType.Text Then 
            path = path & "/" & node.FirstChild.Name
            node = node.FirstChild
            GetPath(node)
        End If
    End Sub

End Class

Hope someone can build on this and give some insights.

[jkmyoung]

Lines 15 - 19.
You're only attacking the first child. You should be able to put just
if node.HasChildNo des
(remove the = true)

I'm not sure of the exact syntax in vb, but it goes something like:

dim children = node.ChildNodes
For i = 0 To children.length
  dim child = children[i]
  path = path & "/" & child.Name 
  GetPath(child) 
Next i

[oscar2]

Thanks.. i working on it :)

[jkmyoung]

Note, edited the above code, accidentally put GetPath(node) when I meant
GetPath(child)

[oscar2]

It is rather confusing right :)
Now at last I got it to work. Check this out:

Sub GetPaths(ByVal node As Xml.XmlNode, ByVal paths As List(Of String), Optional ByVal path As String = "")
        path &= "/" & node.Name
        If Not paths.Contains(path) Then
            paths.Add(path)
            lstPaths.Items.Add(path)
        End If
        For Each child As Xml.XmlNode In node.ChildNodes
            If child.NodeType = Xml.XmlNodeType.Element Then
                GetPaths(child, paths, path)
            End If
        Next
    End Sub

and...

Dim xDoc As New XmlDocument
Dim paths As New List(Of String)
GetPaths(xDoc.DocumentElement, paths)
lstPaths.SelectedIndex = 0

Problem solved ;)