'''NOTE''': Some people think that MiniDOM is a slow and very memory hungry DOM implementation. According to these people, if you are looking for a fast, memory efficient and simple to use tool for working with XML, try ElementTree instead (in the [[http://docs.python.org/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html | xml.etree]] package), or use the external [[http://lxml.de/ | lxml]] implementation.

Some notes on how to use {{{xml.dom.minidom}}}:

{{{
#!python
from xml.dom.minidom import parse, parseString

dom1 = parse( "foaf.rdf" )   # parse an XML file
dom2 = parseString( "<myxml>Some data <empty/> some more data</myxml>" )
print dom1.toxml()
print dom2.toxml()
}}}

== Examples of Use ==

 * node.nodeName
 * node.nodeValue
 * node.childNodes

=== Find Elements ===

You can manually walk through the {{{childNodes}}} tree, comparing {{{nodeName}}}s.

You might be able to use {{{getElementsByTagName}}} as well:

{{{
#!python
from xml.dom.minidom import parse
dom = parse("foo.xml")
for node in dom.getElementsByTagName('bar'):  # visit every node <bar />
    print node.toxml()
}}}

{{{getElementsByTagName}}} finds all children of a given name, no matter how deep, thus working recursively. This is usually good, but can cause problems if similar nodes exist at multiple levels and the intervening nodes are important.

=== Add an Element ===

Create & add an XML element (Something like {{{<foo />}}}) to an XML document.

{{{
#!python
from xml.dom.minidom import parse
dom = parse("bar.xml")
x = dom.createElement("foo")  # creates <foo />
dom.childNodes[1].appendChild(x)  # appends at end of 1st child's children
print dom.toxml()
}}}

=== Add an Element with Text Inside ===

Create & add an XML element to an XML document, the element has text inside.

ex: {{{<foo>hello, world!</foo>}}}

{{{
#!python
from xml.dom.minidom import parse
dom = parse("bar.xml")
x = dom.createElement("foo")  # creates <foo />
txt = dom.createTextNode("hello, world!")  # creates "hello, world!"
x.appendChild(txt)  # results in <foo>hello, world!</foo>
dom.childNodes[1].appendChild(x)  # appends at end of 1st child's children
print dom.toxml()
}}}

=== Import a Node ===

You can use DOM 2 "importNode" to take part of one XML document, and put it into another XML document.

{{{
#!python
from xml.dom.minidom import parse
dom1 = parse("foo.xml")
dom2 = parse("bar.xml")
x = dom1.importNode(dom2.childNodes[1],  # take 2nd node in "bar.xml"
                    True)  # deep copy
dom1.childNodes[1].appendChild(x)  # append to children of 2nd node in "foo.xml"
print dom1.toxml()
}}}

== Links ==

 * [[http://docs.python.org/lib/module-xml.dom.minidom.html|Python Library Reference, xml.dom.minidom]] -- API documentation
 * [[http://www.faqs.org/docs/diveintopython/kgp_divein.html#kgp.divein|Dive into Python, Chapter 5]] -- works almost entirely out of the minidom API

== See Also ==

 * [[Sax]], PythonXml