Get information from XML file in C# requested in dialog

Question

I'm trying to parse/get the information of an XML file where I have saved the setting values.

I would like to open a dialog, where the user can select the .xml file and after that get the information and load the settings.

The XML file looks like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<Configuration version="1.2" createDate="2018-07-17T10:00:00">
    <AutoScale>1</Autoscale>
    <Threshold>2142</Threshold>
    <MinAuto>14</MinAuto>
    <MinMan>1</MinMan>
    <MaxMan>1</MaxMan>
    <BlueBackground>1</BlueBackground>
    <Contour>1</Contour>
    <Rotate>180</Rotate>
    <Flip>Vertical</Flip>
</Configuration>

My code (in C#) looks like this:

using (var openFileDialogXML = new OpenFileDialog()){
      System.IO.Stream myStream = null;
      openFileDialogXML.InitialDirectory = @System.Environment.CurrentDirectory;
      openFileDialogXML.Filter = "xml files (*.xml)|*.xml|All files (*.*)|*.*";
      openFileDialogXML.FilterIndex = 1;
      openFileDialogXML.RestoreDirectory = true;

      DialogResult dr = openFileDialogXML.ShowDialog();

      if (dr == System.Windows.Forms.DialogResult.OK)
      {
            using (XmlReader reader = XmlReader.Create(openFileDialogXML.FileName))
            {
                 reader.MoveToContent();
                 var version = reader.GetAttribute("version");
                 while (reader.Read())
                 {
                     if (reader.NodeType == XmlNodeType.Element)
                     {
                          switch (reader.Name)
                          {
                               case "AutoScale":
                                    //Get AutoScale value
                                    break;
                               case "Threshold":
                                    break;
                               case "MinAuto":
                                    break;
                               case "MinMan":
                                    break;
                               case "MaxMan":
                                    break;
                               }

                            }
                        }
                    }

I'm open to use any parser but I would like to read it element by element because it could happen that we add new settings in the future.

Can you please help me/ give me some advice about how I can reach this?

Answer 1

I like using Xml Linq and putting results into a dictionary so when new items are added the xml parser doesn't have to change :

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Xml;
using System.Xml.Linq;

namespace ConsoleApplication53
{
    class Program
    {
        const string FILENAME = @"c:\temp\test.xml";
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            XDocument doc = XDocument.Load(FILENAME);

            Dictionary<string, string> dict = doc.Element("Configuration").Elements()
                .GroupBy(x => x.Name.LocalName, y => (string)y)
                .ToDictionary(x => x.Key, y => y.FirstOrDefault());

        }
    }
}

Answer 2

I would suggest to use DataContract and load the XML into specified object. When your configuration file changes, you would need to update also the Entity.

[DataContract]
public class MyXmlClass
{
    [DataMember]
    public int PropertyToSerialize { get; set; }
}

You can then use DataContractSerializer as described here - https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/framework/wcf/feature-details/serialization-and-deserialization

It will be much easier for you to work with object than parsing XML manually :)

Answer 3

Some quick and dirty answer if you want to parse it manually:

using System.Xml;

[...]

XmlTextReader xtr = new XmlTextReader(GetResourceStream("config.xml"));
while (xtr.Read())
{
if (xtr.AttributeCount == 0)
    continue;

if (xtr.LocalName == "Configuration")
{
    string version = xtr.GetAttribute("version");
    string date = xtr.GetAttribute("createDate");
    Console.WriteLine($"version={version} - date = {date}")
}
else if (xtr.LocalName == "AutoScale")
{
    string autoscale = xtr.ReadString();
    Console.WriteLine($"autoscale={autoscale}")
}

[...]

}
xtr.Close();

I didn't try the code, if you need more start by looking XmlTextReader examples or documentation (stackoverflow should have plenty of them)