Unable to match XML element using Python regular expression

Question

I have an XML document with the following structure-

> <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <!-- generated by CLiX/Wiki2XML
> [MPI-Inf, MMCI@UdS] $LastChangedRevision: 93 $ on 17.04.2009
> 12:50:48[mciao0826] --> <!DOCTYPE article SYSTEM "../article.dtd">
> <article xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <header>
> <title>Postmodern art</title> <id>192127</id> <revision>
> <id>244517133</id> <timestamp>2008-10-11T05:26:50Z</timestamp>
> <contributor> <username>FairuseBot</username> <id>1022055</id>
> </contributor> </revision> <categories> <category>Contemporary
> art</category> <category>Modernism</category> <category>Art
> movements</category> <category>Postmodern art</category> </categories>
> </header> <bdy> Postmodernism preceded by Modernism '' Postmodernity
> Postchristianity Postmodern philosophy Postmodern architecture
> Postmodern art Postmodernist film Postmodern literature Postmodern
> music Postmodern theater Critical theory Globalization Consumerism
> </bdy>

I am interested in capturing the text contained within ... and for that I wrote the following Python 3 regex code-

file = open("sample_xml.xml", "r")
xml_doc = file.read()
file.close()

body_text = re.findall(r'<bdy>(.+)</bdy>', xml_doc)

But 'body_text' is always returning an empty list. However, when I try to capture the text for the tags ... using code-

category_text = re.findall(r'(.+)', xml_doc)

This does the job. Any idea(s) as to why the ... XML element code is not working?

Thanks!

TheGreatGeek · Accepted Answer · 2018-11-10 00:23:02Z

2

The special character . will not match a newline, so that regex will not match a multiline string.

You can change this behavior by specifying the DOTALL flag. To specify that flag you can include this at the start of your regular expression: (?s)

More information on Python's regular expression syntax can be found here: https://docs.python.org/3/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax

answered Nov 10, 2018 at 0:23

TheGreatGeek

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Ashok KS · Accepted Answer · 2018-11-10 01:26:00Z

1

You can use re.DOTALL

category_text = re.findall(r'<bdy>(.+)</bdy>', xml_doc, re.DOTALL)

Output:

[" Postmodernism preceded by Modernism '' Postmodernity\n> Postchristianity Postmodern philosophy Postmodern architecture\n> Postmodern art Postmodernist film Postmodern literature Postmodern\n> music Postmodern theater Critical theory Globalization Consumerism\n> "]

answered Nov 10, 2018 at 1:26

Ashok KS

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