XML Parsing in QTP using XMLUtil - A Simple Example

XML parsing in QTP is not a very difficult concept rather it is the most easiest of concepts in QTP. However, there are times when you have not worked on XML before and there is a task at hand and you do not wish to spend time reading QTP Help or going on the web spending a lot of time. I am showcasing a very simple XML structure and how to parse data out of it. There are a lot of examples on the web but none of them is a full fledged one. It rather showcases a particular functionality and never shows a complete solution from getting a XML loaded and finally extracting values from it.

Here, i assume that you have a basic understanding of XML schema and what you mean by extracting data from it. The basic concept in QTP is to create an object of the XML data that you have at hand either in the form of a explicit file stored at a location or the XML data in the form of string in a variable.

Loading XML data from a File/URL

You can load an XML file in QTP which then gives you access to the entire XML structure of the file. You can then use the XMLUtil functions on the XML data and get your desired task done. This is how we do it -

Set xmlObj = XMLUtil.CreateXML()
xmlObj.LoadFile("http://www.w3schools.com/xml/cd_catalog.xml")
Print xmlObj.ToString()

OR

Set xmlObj = XMLUtil.CreateXML()
xmlObj.LoadFile("C:\cd_catalog.xml")
Print xmlObj.ToString()
'Using a XML file stored on the hard drive

Loading XML data from a variable

It is handy sometimes, when you are testing a web application and have a chunk of XML data as a result of a property of an object (like innerHTML, outerHTML, etc) and you need the dynamic data from that XML to verify something. Here, you load the XML from a variable and then apply the XMlUtil methods on it. This is how we do it -

Set xmlObj = XMLUtil.CreateXML()
xmlData = "PUT YOUR XML DATA WITH ENTIRE STRUCTURE HERE"
' xmlData will hold the entire content of the XML file 
xmlObj.Load(xmlData)
Print xmlObj.ToString()

Parsing the XML

Once we have the XML data loaded with the XML object pointing to it, our job is very simple. We need to navigate through the structure looking for the data we want. In this example we wish to retrieve all the data related a particular CD in the CD Catalog. So what we do is that we utilize the ChildElementsByPath(Path) method do retrieve the data from each element of the XML. Here, "Path" is something common to the kind of path we specify in our PC for locating a particular file. Here, each XML tag can be considered as a folder with the XML Element value as a file. So the topmost folder becomes CATALOG, then comes CD, then (TITLE, ARTIST, COUNTRY, COMPANY, PRICE,YEAR) become the individual folders with CD. So in case you wish to find the Title of a particular CD, you use ChildElementsByPath("/CATALOG/CD/TITLE"). This will actually return a collection of titles of all the Cds and you can iterate through each to get your desired CD title. A similar approach may be employed for getting the other data like, artist, company, price and year. This is just a simple example, there are a number of other XMl methods in QTP that can be used as well. Have a look at the code below -

Set xmlObj = XMLUtil.CreateXML()
xmlObj.LoadFile("http://www.w3schools.com/xml/cd_catalog.xml")
Print xmlObj.ToString()
Print " ========================================================================= "


Set myCDTitle= xmlObj.ChildElementsByPath("/CATALOG/CD/TITLE")
'Get the titles
Set myCDArtist = xmlObj.ChildElementsByPath("/CATALOG/CD/ARTIST")
'Get the Artists
Set myCDCountry = xmlObj.ChildElementsByPath("/CATALOG/CD/COUNTRY")
'Get the Country
Set myCDPrice = xmlObj.ChildElementsByPath("/CATALOG/CD/PRICE")
'Get the Prices
Set myCDYear = xmlObj.ChildElementsByPath("/CATALOG/CD/YEAR")
'Get the Year

'Now iterate through the collection to get the values
 For i = 1 to myCDTitle.Count
  Print myCDTitle.Item(i).Value()
  Print myCDArtist.Item(i).Value()
  Print myCDCountry.Item(i).Value()
  Print myCDPrice.Item(i).Value()
  Print myCDYear.Item(i).Value()
  Print " "
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