asked on

VS C# Writing XML

I have just begun looking into how to write an xml file using visual studio c#. I came across this sample code and I can see I need to define 'book' someplace. How do I correct this code to define the proper structure for book? It has the Title, Author.Name, Publisher, Price attributes.

XmlWriterSettings settings = new XmlWriterSettings();
settings.Indent = true;
settings.IndentChars = (" ");
settings.CloseOutput = true;
settings.OmitXmlDeclaration = true;
using (XmlWriter writer = XmlWriter.Create("books.xml", settings))
{
writer.WriteStartElement("book");
writer.WriteElementString("title", book.Title);
writer.WriteElementString("author", book.Author.Name);
writer.WriteElementString("publisher", book.Publisher);
writer.WriteElementString("price", book.Price.ToString());
writer.WriteEndElement();
writer.Flush();

kaufmed

It would help if you showed the XML structure you are trying to achieve.

rwheeler23

ASKER

My apologies. Here it is:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>

<books>
<book ISBN="9831123212" yearpublished="2002">
<title>A Programmer's Guide to ADO.NET using C#</title>
<author>
<first-name>Mahesh</first-name>
<last-name>Chand</last-name>
</author>
<publisher>Apress</publisher>
<price>44.99</price>
</book>
</books>

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

kaufmed

membership

This solution is only available to members.

To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.

Start Free Trial

rwheeler23

ASKER

Excellent. Thank you.

Daniel Van Der Werken

Kaufmed's answer is the correct answer. However, I wonder if your actual question is more basic. You need a class or structure defined that has the object you want, right?

I came across this sample code and I can see I need to define 'book' someplace. How do I correct this code to define the proper structure for book? It has the Title, Author.Name, Publisher, Price attributes.

First, you need to create your classes:

    public class Author
    {
        public struct AuthorName
        {
            [XmlElement("first-name")]
            public string First_Name;
            [XmlElement("last-name")]
            public string Last_Name;
        };

        private AuthorName name = new AuthorName();
        public AuthorName Name
        {
            get
            {
                return name;
            }
            set
            {
                name = value;
            }
        }

        public Author(string first, string last)
        {
            name = new AuthorName();
            name.First_Name = first;
            name.Last_Name = last;
        }

    }

    public class Book
    {
        public string Title { get; set; }
        public string Publisher { get; set; }
        public decimal Price { get; set; }
        public Author Author { get; set; }
        public string ISBN { get; set; }
        public string Year_Published { get; set; }
    }

Open in new window

Next, the code to write this is almost exactly like kaufmed's solution:

public void doIt()
        {
            Book book = new Book();
            book.Title = "A Programmer's Guide to ADO.NET using C#";
            book.Price = 44.99M;
            book.Publisher = "Apress";
            book.Author = new Author("Mahesh", "Chanad");
            book.ISBN = "9831123212";
            book.Year_Published = "2002";

            XmlWriterSettings settings = new XmlWriterSettings();
            settings.Indent = true;
            settings.IndentChars = ("    ");
            settings.CloseOutput = true;
            settings.OmitXmlDeclaration = true;
            using (XmlWriter writer = XmlWriter.Create(@"C:\books.xml", settings))
            {
                writer.WriteStartElement("books");
                writer.WriteStartElement("book");
                writer.WriteAttributeString("ISBN", book.ISBN);
                writer.WriteAttributeString("Year-Published", book.Year_Published);
                writer.WriteElementString("title", book.Title);
                writer.WriteStartElement("author");
                writer.WriteElementString("first-name", book.Author.Name.First_Name);
                writer.WriteElementString("last-name", book.Author.Name.Last_Name);
                writer.WriteEndElement();
                writer.WriteElementString("publisher", book.Publisher);
                writer.WriteElementString("price", book.Price.ToString());
                writer.WriteEndElement();
                writer.WriteEndElement();
                writer.Flush();

            }
        }

Open in new window

Here's the actual output from this code:

<books>
    <book ISBN="9831123212" Year-Published="2002">
        <title>A Programmer's Guide to ADO.NET using C#</title>
        <author>
            <first-name>Mahesh</first-name>
            <last-name>Chanad</last-name>
        </author>
        <publisher>Apress</publisher>
        <price>44.99</price>
    </book>
</books>

Open in new window

rwheeler23

ASKER

That though dawned on me as I working on some other code. I continue to be impressed by the knowledge that is shared on this website. Thanks to all of you my code gets cleaner and more efficient with each application.