Xml newbie

Ruby
1

Okay, so I am scraping the FAA site and keeping track of some airplanes.

A lot of the time I get a tail number and I have it already, so I am
going to store the important information in a file that is
{tailnumber}.xml

That way I can add some of my own information (email address of owner,
airport last sighted).

I’ve never written any xml. But apparently there are gems I could add
to my Ruby installation which would let me write it.

Suggestions for where to start?

I assume I’ll wind up with a file that has
DA20
408.21

and I can say things like
serial = xml(‘serial’)
and
xml(serial) = ‘408.21’
right?

I can picture writing these things, but I bet someone has already done
the work.

Thanks,
–Colin

2

On 6/22/07, Colin S. [email protected] wrote:

to my Ruby installation which would let me write it.

Suggestions for where to start?

You’ll want to take a look at HPricot[0] and/or XML Builder[1]

[0] http://code.whytheluckystiff.net/hpricot/
[1] http://rubyforge.org/projects/builder

3

On Jun 22, 7:27 pm, “Colin S.” [email protected] wrote:

to my Ruby installation which would let me write it.
xml(serial) = ‘408.21’
right?

I can picture writing these things, but I bet someone has already done the work.

Thanks,
–Colin

Why bother with xml at all? For something this small YAML would work
just as well and requires less work too.

require ‘yaml’
planes = [ {:tailnumber => ‘N1234Z’, :model => ‘DA20’, :serial =>
‘408.21’},
{:tailnumber => ‘N1234AZ’, :model => ‘magic happy
plane’, :serial => ‘42’} ]
#write planes
File.open(“planes.yaml”, “w”) { |f| f.puts tree.to_yaml }

#read planes
planes = YAML.load(File.open(“planes.yaml”))
puts planes.first[:serial]
#408.21

4

On 6/23/07, [email protected] [email protected] wrote:

I’ve never written any xml. But apparently there are gems I could add
and
xml(serial) = ‘408.21’
right?

I can picture writing these things, but I bet someone has already done the work.

Thanks,
–Colin

Why bother with xml at all? For something this small YAML would work
just as well and requires less work too.

Oh, for some reason I thought the OP was scraping XML files and wanted
to keep the structure intact but just change parts. If all that is
needed is data persistence, YAML is a better choice for sure.

5

On Jun 23, 12:16 am, “[email protected]” [email protected]
wrote:

That way I can add some of my own information (email address of owner,

#read planes
planes = YAML.load(File.open(“planes.yaml”))
puts planes.first[:serial]
#408.21

Errr tree.to_yaml should of course be planes.to_yaml. It’s late :slight_smile: