xml element tree to html problem

[Fredrik Lundh]

Ron Adam wrote:

> I have an element tree structure of nested elements that I want to
> convert to html as nested definition and unordered lists in the
> following way.
>
>      <object>
>         <name>ball</ball>
>         <desc>
>            <color>red</color>
>            <size>large</size>
>         </desc>
>      </object>
>
>
> To...
>
>      <dl class='object'>
>         <dt class='name'>ball</dt>
>         <dd class='desc'>
>            <ul>
>               <li class='color'>red</li>
>               <li class='size'>large</li>
>            </ul>
>         </dd>
>      </dl>
>
>
> Where each xml tag has a predefined relationship to either definition
> list  or an unordered list html tag.  'object' is always mapped to <dl
> class='object'>,  'name' is always mapped to <dt class='name'>.  etc...
>
> So I will probably have a dictionary to look them up.  The problem I
> have is finding a relatively painless way to do the actual translation.

here's one way to do it:

    import cElementTree as ET

    tree = ET.XML("""
    <object>
        <name>ball</name>
        <desc>
            <color>red</color>
            <size>large</size>
        </desc>
    </object>
    """)

    MAP = {
        "object": ("dl", "object"),
        "name":   ("dt", "name"),
        "desc":   ("ul", None),
        "color":  ("li", "color"),
        "size":   ("li", "size"),
    }

    for elem in tree.getiterator():
        elem.tag, klass = MAP[elem.tag]
        if klass:
            elem.set("class", klass)

    print ET.tostring(tree)

this prints:

    <dl class="object">
        <dt class="name">ball</dt>
        <ul>
            <li class="color">red</li>
            <li class="size">large</li>
        </ul>
    </dl>


here's a somewhat simpler (but less general) version:

    MAP = dict(object="dl", name="dt", desc="ul", color="li", size="li")

    for elem in tree.getiterator():
        if elem.tag != "desc":
            elem.set("class", elem.tag)
        elem.tag = MAP[elem.tag]

hope this helps!

</F>