Python xml absolute path

Question

How do I use python to print/dump the "absolute path" and value for an XML document?

for example:

<A>
  <B>foo</B>
  <C>
    <D>On</D>
  </C>
  <E>Auto</E>
  <F>
    <G>
      <H>shoo</H>
      <I>Off</I>
    </G>
  </F>
</A>

to

/A/B, foo
/A/C/D, On
/A/E, Auto
/A/F/G/H, shoo
/A/F/G/I, Off

Answer 1

from lxml import etree
root = etree.XML(your_xml_string)

def print_path_of_elems(elem, elem_path=""):
    for child in elem:
        if not child.getchildren() and child.text:
            # leaf node with text => print
            print "%s/%s, %s" % (elem_path, child.tag, child.text)
        else:
            # node with child elements => recurse
            print_path_of_elems(child, "%s/%s" % (elem_path, child.tag))

print_path_of_elems(root, root.tag)

Answer 2

Another way to do this would be something like:

from lxml import etree

XMLDoc = etree.parse(open('file.xml'))

for Node in XMLDoc.xpath('//*'):
    if not Node.getchildren() and Node.text:
        print XMLDoc.getpath(Node), Node.text

Depending on the structure of your document you may get node numbers in the xpath which you might have to strip out.