Scala: how to create XML nodes from some collection

Question

If you have something like:

val myStuff = Array(Person("joe",40), Person("mary", 35))

How do you create an XML value with that data as nodes? I know how to use { braces } in an XML expression to put a value, but this is a collection of values. Do I need to iterate explicitly or is there something better?

val myXml = <people>{ /* what here?! */ }</people>

The resulting value should be something like:

<people><person><name>joe</name><age>40</age></person>
<person><name>mary</name><age>39</age></person></people>

Answer 1

As it's a functional programming language Array.map is probably what you're looking for:

class Person(name : String, age : Int){
    def toXml() = <person><name>{ name }</name><age>{ age }</age></person>
}

object xml {
    val people = List(
        new Person("Alice", 16),
        new Person("Bob", 64)
    )

    val data = <people>{ people.map(p => p.toXml()) }</people>

    def main(args : Array[String]){
        println(data)
    }
}

Results in:

<people><person><name>Alice</name><age>16</age></person><person><name>Bob</name><age>64</age></person></people>

A formatted result (for a better read):

<people>
   <person>
      <name>Alice</name>
      <age>16</age>
   </person>
   <person>
      <name>Bob</name>
      <age>64</age>
   </person>
</people>