PowerTip: Use PowerShell to Easily Read an XML Document

Hi Ed,

thanks for sharing....here a proxy function:

Function Get-Content {

<#

------------EXAMPLE---------------8<-----------------------------------------  

PS II> $file = "$PSHOME\types.ps1xml"

PS II> $u = cat $file -As | Select-Xml -XP "//ScriptProperty" | Select -Expand Node

PS II> $u

PS II> $Xml = Get-Content $file -AsXml

PS II> $Xml.Types.Type[1..10]

---------------------------8<---------------------AUTHOR: Walid Toumi-------

.ForwardHelpTargetName Get-Content

.ForwardHelpCategory Cmdlet

#>

[CmdletBinding(DefaultParameterSetName='Path', SupportsTransactions=$true)]

param(

   [Parameter(ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true)]

   [System.Int64]

   ${ReadCount},

   [Parameter(ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true)]

   [System.Int64]

   ${TotalCount},

   [Parameter(ParameterSetName='Path', Mandatory=$true, Position=0, ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true)]

   [System.String[]]

   ${Path},

   [Parameter(ParameterSetName='LiteralPath', Mandatory=$true, Position=0, ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true)]

   [Alias('PSPath')]

   [System.String[]]

   ${LiteralPath},

   [System.String]

   ${Filter},

   [System.String[]]

   ${Include},

   [System.String[]]

   ${Exclude},

   [Switch]

   ${Force},

   [Switch]

   ${AsXml},

   [Parameter(ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true)]

   [System.Management.Automation.PSCredential]

   ${Credential})

begin

{

   try {

       $outBuffer = $null

       if ($PSBoundParameters.TryGetValue('OutBuffer', [ref]$outBuffer))

       {

           $PSBoundParameters['OutBuffer'] = 1

       }

       $wrappedCmd = $ExecutionContext.InvokeCommand.GetCommand('Microsoft.PowerShell.Management\Get-Content', [System.Management.Automation.CommandTypes]::Cmdlet)

       $cmd = ''

        if($AsXml) {

         [void]$PSBoundParameters.Remove('AsXml')

         $cmd += ' | ForEach-Object {$fx=@()} {$fx+=$_} {$fx -as [Xml]}'

       }

       $ScriptCmd = [ScriptBlock]::Create(

          { & $wrappedCmd @PSBoundParameters }.ToString() + $Cmd

         )

       $steppablePipeline = $scriptCmd.GetSteppablePipeline($myInvocation.CommandOrigin)

       $steppablePipeline.Begin($PSCmdlet)

   } catch {

       throw

   }

}

process

{

   try {

       $steppablePipeline.Process($_)

   } catch {

       throw

   }

}

end

{

   try {

       $steppablePipeline.End()

   } catch {

       throw

   }

}

}

#########

PS II> $xml= cat c:\xmlfile.xml -asxml ; $xml

@Walid Toumi this is great. Thank you for sharing. Would you consider uploading this to the scripting guys script repository? It would make it eaiser to copy.

Very nice. I have used this feature quite often already to import collections / packages / etc. into SCCM, based on an XML input file!

I'm using PowerShell 3 and tried your example without the [xml] accelerator and everything seemed to work fine.  What does the accelerator do and is really needed?

@Craig the [xml] type accelerator converts the text into an XMLDocument type of object. This permits navigation of the pieces of the document using a dotted notation. Without it, you only have text and not XML. See my article I wrote here: blogs.technet.com/.../use-powershell-to-simplify-access-to-xml-data.aspx

@all -

Note that this will not work if the content is wrapped in a namespace.  To resolve namespaces you will need to either use the namespace manager or use the Select-XML CmdLet with its namespace support.

I think hear Ed madly typing a blog article on this.

Excelente! Simples e direto!!! (Y)