Unsuccessfully extracting InnerText from child nodes of XML document (C#)

Question

The XML I'm working with is as follows:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><entry_list version="1.0"><entry 
id="commode"><ew>commode</ew><subj>HH-2#CL-1#FU-2a,b,c#BD-2d</subj><art>
<artref id="commode" /><capt>commode 1</capt><dim>54,18</dim></art>
<hw>com*mode</hw><sound><wav>commod01.wav</wav><wpr>ku-!mOd</wpr></sound>
<pr>kə-ˈmōd</pr><fl>noun</fl><et>French, from <it>commode,</it> adjective, 
suitable, convenient, from Latin <it>commodus,</it> from <it>com-</it> + 
<it>modus</it> measure <ma>mete</ma></et><def><date>circa 1688</date>
<sn>1</sn><dt>:a woman's ornate cap popular in the late 17th and early 18th 
centuries</dt><sn>2 a</sn><dt>:a low chest of drawers</dt><sn>b</sn><dt>:a 
movable washstand with a cupboard underneath</dt><sn>c</sn><dt>:a boxlike 
structure holding a chamber pot under an open seat</dt><sd>also</sd><dt>:
<sx>chamber pot</sx></dt><sn>d</sn><dt>:<sx>toilet <sxn>3b</sxn></sx></dt>
</def><art><bmp>commode.bmp</bmp><cap>commode 
1</cap></art></entry></entry_list> 

The code I'm using, which I cobbled together from various related questions:

System.Xml.XmlNodeList elemList = doc.GetElementsByTagName("dt");
List<string> defs = new List<string>();

for (int count = 0; count < elemList.Count; count++)
{
    string contents = string.Empty;
    foreach (System.Xml.XmlNode child in elemList[count])
    {

        if (child.NodeType == System.Xml.XmlNodeType.Element)
        {
            contents += child.InnerText;
        }
    }
    defs.Insert(count, contents);
}

The resulting List of "defs" is empty for any number of reasons, all of which are unknown to me.

Answer 1

This is using LINQ. Pass "dt" for the elementName parameter.

static List<string> GetInnerText(XDocument xDoc, string elementName)
{
    var children = from node in xDoc.Descendants(elementName).DescendantNodes()
                   where node.NodeType == XmlNodeType.Text
                   select ((XText)node).Value;
    return children.ToList();
}

I'm not sure if above is exactly what you want, so here's an alternative solution.

static List<string> GetInnerText(XmlDocument xDoc, string elementName)
{
    List<string> innerText = new List<string>();
    var children = xDoc.GetElementsByTagName(elementName);
    foreach (XmlNode child in children)
        innerText.Add(child.InnerText);
    return innerText;
}

Answer 2

elemList = doc.GetElementsByTagName("dt"); returns an XmlNodeList. You can directly iterate this.

change this System.Xml.XmlNode child in elemList[count] to System.Xml.XmlNode child in elemList and look at the value of child in debugger.