XML Replace node with a set of Nodes

Question

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Thanks for the help in advance. I have this sample xml document. I would like to select the Address element with all its children and replace it with <Sam />. In other words, I would like to replace <Sam /> with <Address> ……</Address>

XML

<Contact>
    <Name>Patrick Hines</Name>
    <Phone>206-555-0144</Phone>
    <Address>
      <Street1>123 Main St</Street1>
      <City><city w:st="on"><place w:st="on">Mercer Island</place></city></City>
      <State>WA</State>
      <Postal>68042</Postal>
    </Address>
     <Date>
      <FirstDate>7/23/2011</FirstDate>
      <LastDate>6/20/2012</LastDate>
    </Date>
  <Sam />
  </Contact

Posted 17-Jul-12 4:51am

mzammari

Updated 17-Jul-12 4:56am

Sandeep Mewara

v2

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Comments

[no name] 17-Jul-12 10:54am

Did you bother reading your question before clicking the Submit button?

Richard MacCutchan 17-Jul-12 10:57am

Whichever way round you want to do it, what is your problem?

Sandeep Mewara 17-Jul-12 11:01am

I am not clear on output expected even thought question states what you are trying. I am not clear on what/why too.

mzammari 17-Jul-12 11:12am

I would like to select all elements in ("Contact/Address") which would give me a collection of elements. now I would like to take this collection and replace Sam element with this collection:

XDocument doc = XDocument.Load(filePath);

IEnumerable "<"XElement">" Ad = doc.XPathSelectElements("/Contact/Address");

and after that I am lost.

Matt T Heffron 17-Jul-12 13:47pm

Can you show what the xml should be AFTER this?
It appears that you want the Street1, City, State, Postal elements to be SPLICED into where the Sam element is? Do you want them to be COPIED or MOVED?

mzammari 17-Jul-12 14:28pm

Matt, I would like them to copied (i.e., Address, Street, City, State, and postal) in the place of Sam /

Matt T Heffron 17-Jul-12 17:16pm

So from THIS comment, it looks like you just want the single Address element WITH ITS CONTENT to be copied to where the Sam/ element is? (As OPPOSED to copying the 4 Street1, City, State, Postal elements individually to the Sam/ location, which is what your PREVIOUS comment implied.) Please show what the xml should be AFTER!

mzammari 18-Jul-12 9:47am

Matt,
I want to copy Street1,City, State, Postal to Sam empty Element. so it should be: Sam - Street1,City, State, Postal - Sam

mzammari 19-Jul-12 8:34am

Thank you, Matt. the XML file I have for this question is only a sample file.

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Matt T Heffron · Accepted Answer · 2012-07-18T17:39:00

Ok, from your last comment above, I think I know what you want. (It isn't either of the interpretations that I thought you wanted.)
First your XPath expression was off by a bit.
Then you just needed to copy the elements and Add them to the Sam element.

C#

XDocument doc = XDocument.Load(filePath);
IEnumerable<XElement> Ad = doc.XPathSelectElements("/Contact/Address/*");
var sam = doc.XPathSelectElement("/Contact/Sam");
foreach (var item in Ad)
{
  var newItem = new XElement(item);
  sam.Add(newItem);
}

At this point doc is:

XML

<contact>
  <Name>Patrick Hines</Name>
  <Phone>206-555-0144</Phone>
  <Address>
    <Street1>123 Main St</Street1>
    <City>
      <city w:st="on">
        <place w:st="on">Mercer Island</place>
      </city>
    </City>
    <State>WA</State>
    <Postal>68042</Postal>
  </Address>
  <Date>
    <FirstDate>7/23/2011</FirstDate>
    <LastDate>6/20/2012</LastDate>
  </Date>
  <Sam>
    <Street1>123 Main St</Street1>
    <City>
      <city w:st="on">
        <place w:st="on">Mercer Island</place>
      </city>
    </City>
    <State>WA</State>
    <Postal>68042</Postal>
  </Sam>
</Contact>

An additional comment: This XML design is not ideal in that it is easy for humans to mis-read it, due to the <City> and <city> that differ only by the case of the first letter.
If you can, I'd suggest redesigning this for better readability.