How to create object collection from an xml

Question

I have an xml like the following

<DataCollection>
  <Data>
    <Name>John</Name>
    <Age>30</Age>
  </Data>
  ... more person
</DataCollection>

I want to create an object (or some type) collection with Name, Age as fields. One problem that I have is I don't know the structure before hand (all I know is, there will be DataCollection and Data) to create a class and then using linq to use select new. Current implementation, I am walking the XML for each Data, read the elements and create a comma separated list.

Is there a better way to do this? The purpose of the XML is to display all the data that is coming in under Data in a data grid.

Answer 1

FWIW here's the LINQ query that'll turn that XML document into a collection of objects:

    var coll = from XElement c in doc.Descendants("Data") 
       select new { 
           Name = c.Element("Name").Value, 
           Age = int.Parse(c.Element("Age").Value) 
       };

But I think what you're really looking for is a way to bind the XML document to a DataGrid directly. One way to do that is to bind your DataGrid to a DataTable and use its WriteXml/ReadXml methods to read/write the file.

On preview ... I missed the requirement that the structure of the incoming XML is unknown. You can build up a collection of collections of objects without knowing the structure of the Data blocks using this LINQ:

var coll = from XElement c in loaded.Descendants("Data")
       select (from XElement d in c.Elements() select d.Value);

Or you can generate the CSV with this:

string csv = string.Join(Environment.NewLine, 
( from XElement c in loaded.Descendants("Data") 
  select string.Join(",", 
    (from XElement d in c.Elements() select d.Value).ToArray())
).ToArray());

Answer 2

I hope I understand your question... anyway - Assuming that you use asp.net since you mentioned Linq, dictionaries are your best choice.

you can find more about them here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/xfhwa508.aspx

In general, dictionary holds key/value pairs so you don't have to use the commas and be able to use loops like you should.

Hope that helps!

Answer 3

If data is read only have you considered using Xslt to format it into a Html table?

Here is an article I found on stackoverflow that covers this...

Then it seems like the child elements of could change all they wanted yet they would still be render to your grid (html table)...