Parsexml

Purpose

Convert XML file to a MATLAB structure.

Synopsis

[object,theStruct] = parsexml(filename,nooutertag);

If input filename is omitted, the user will be prompted for a file name to read.

Description

Creates Matlab object from XML file. The format of the file must follow that used by ENCODEXML. Each XML tag will be encoded as a field in a Matlab structure. The top-level tag will be the single field in the top-level of the returned structure. All sub-tags will be sub-fields. Contents of the fields are specified using the 'class' attributes of each tag. When 'class' is omitted, a single-entry (non-array) structure is assumed. Tags with the attribute 'class' will be encoded using the following rules:

• class="string": Contents encoded as string or padded string array. If multiple row string, each row should be enclosed in <sr> tags.

• class="numeric"  : Contents of tag must be a comma-delimited list of values with rows delimited by semicolons. Each row must have the same number of entries (each row must be equal in length) or an error will result. Multi-way matricies can be encapsulated in <tn mode="i"> tags where i is the mode that the enclosed item expands on (i>=3).

Example: row vector

      <item class="numeric"> 1,2,3,4 </item> 

Example: 2-way matrix

      <item class="numeric"> 11,12,13,14; 21 22 23 24 </item> 

Example: 3-way

      <item class="numeric">
        <tn mode="3"> 
          111,112,113,114; 121,122,123,124 
        </tn> 
        <tn mode="3"> 
          211,212,213,214; 221,222,223,224
        </tn> 
      </item> 

• class="cell"  : Contents encoded as Matlab cell. The format of contents is the same as HTML table tags (<tr> for a new row, <td> for a new container/column) with the added tag of <tn mode="i"> to describe a multi-dimensional cell (see class="numeric").

Example: 3-way cell (with strings in each cell)

       <item class="cell"> 
         <tn mode="3"> 
            <tr> <td>slab 1, row 1, col 1<td> <td>slab 1, row 1, col 2<td> </tr>
            <tr> <td>slab 1, row 2, col 1<td> <td>slab 1, row 2, col 2<td> </tr>
         </tn> 
         <tn mode="3"> 
            <tr> <td>slab 2, row 1, col 1<td> <td>slab 2, row 1, col 2<td> </tr>
            <tr> <td>slab 2, row 2, col 1<td> <td>slab 2, row 2, col 2<td> </tr>
         </tn> 
       </item class="cell"> 

• class="structure" : Used for struture arrays ONLY. Contents encoded into a structure array use array notation identical to that described for class="cell". If a structure is size [1 1] then it does not need to use array notation and must not be marked with this class attribute. Instead, the contents of the structure should simply be enclosed within the tag as sub-tags.

• class="dataset"  : Contents will be interpreted as a DataSet Object. Any tags that do not map to valid DataSet Object fields will be ignored. See the DataSet definition for details on valid fields and ENCODEXML for examples of the DataSet XML format.

• NOTE: "Size" attribute: Tags of class "numeric", "cell", or "structure" (structure-array only) should also include the attribute size="[...]" which gives the size of the tag's contents. The size value must be enclosed in square brackets and must be at least two elements long (use [0,0] for empty). For example <myvalue class="numeric" size="[3,4]"> says that the field myvalue will be numeric with 3 rows and 4 columns. Size can be multi-dimensional as needed (size="[2,4,6,2]" implies that the tag contents will be a 4-dimensional array of the given sizes.

See Also

autoimport, encodexml, xclreadr