XmlEx (XML EXtensions) provides a PowerShell domain-specific language (DSL) to easily create and update XML documents without having to understand or manipulate the underlying [System.Xml.XmlDocument] objects. XmlEx provides a simple way to:
- Create and append XML documents in PowerShell
- Manage XML document namespaces and prefixes
Traditionally, creating XML documents with PowerShell is slow, cumbersome and error prone. I discovered this whilst developing the PScribo plugin to create Word documents.
After my eyes started to bleed looking at the code, I decided there had to be an easier way and XmlEx is a result of this!
Take the following short XML document as an example:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes"?>
<w:document xmlns:w="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/wordprocessingml/2006/main" xmlns:xml="http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace">
<w:body>
<w:p>
<w:pPr>
<w:pStyle w:val="MyStyle" />
<w:spacing w:before="160" w:after="160" />
</w:pPr>
<w:r>
<w:t />
</w:r>
</w:p>
</w:body>
</w:document>To generate this in PowerShell code requires something similar to this:
$xmlDocument = New-Object -TypeName 'System.Xml.XmlDocument';
$xmlnsMain = 'http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/wordprocessingml/2006/main';
$null = $xmlDocument.AppendChild($xmlDocument.CreateXmlDeclaration('1.0', 'utf-8', 'yes'));
$documentXml = $xmlDocument.AppendChild($xmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 'document', $xmlnsMain));
$null = $xmlDocument.DocumentElement.SetAttribute('xmlns:xml', 'http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace');
$body = $documentXml.AppendChild($xmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 'body', $xmlnsMain));
$p = $body.AppendChild($XmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 'p', $xmlnsMain));
$pPr = $p.AppendChild($XmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 'pPr', $xmlnsMain));
$pStyle = $pPr.AppendChild($XmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 'pStyle', $xmlnsMain));
$null = $pStyle.SetAttribute('val', $xmlnsMain, 'MyStyle');
$spacing = $pPr.AppendChild($XmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 'spacing', $xmlnsMain));
$null = $spacing.SetAttribute('before', $xmlnsMain, 160);
$null = $spacing.SetAttribute('after', $xmlnsMain, 160);
$r = $p.AppendChild($XmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 'r', $xmlnsMain));
$t = $r.AppendChild($XmlDocument.CreateElement('w', 't', $xmlnsMain));Using XmlEx, this can be simply written as:
$xmlDocument = XmlDocument {
XmlDeclaration -Encoding 'utf-8' -Standalone 'yes'
XmlNamespace -Prefix 'xml' -Uri 'http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace'
XmlElement document -Prefix 'w' -Namespace 'http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/wordprocessingml/2006/main' {
XmlElement 'body' {
XmlElement 'p' {
XmlElement 'pPr' {
XmlElement 'pStyle' {
XmlAttribute 'val' 'MyStyle'
}
XmlElement 'spacing' {
XmlAttribute 'before' '160'
XmlAttribute 'after' '160'
}
}
XmlElement 'r' {
XmlElement 't'
}
}
}
}
}- Install XmlEx module from the PowerShell Gallery:
Install-Module -Name XmlEx -Scope CurrentUser
Import-Module XmlExThere are examples in module's \Examples folder.