If you are a website developer there are two different types of XML data sources you will come across. The first is a live feed directly to a database which can be found in an example of Amazon.com’s XML feed for affiliates. The second is an XML File that is an export of a database that you can then use to build a website from but better is to import the file into another database.
If you are accessing a XML database then php SimpleXML is your friend and there are also tools to import data directly into mySQL from a XML File but if you need to edit a few fields within a XML Document you may find that it is difficult to import the file into NotePad or other text editors and resave it.
Well although there are a number of commercial products out there Microsoft has made available some of their own free tools for developers.
Now you can’t expect all the features such as direct import or transfer of data into a mySQL Database found in commercial products but XMLNotepad is worth the download.
It will allow you to import an XML File of a few Megs in size and with an expanding tree view find the node you want to edit and resave the file.
You can also export an XSD file showing the format of the XML Data in the file or an XLS file that you can use in other software.
This is really a decent tool to have around and it can be downloaded for free from Microsofts website.
In our tests a 1mb file loaded in just a few seconds and a 24mb file loaded but was slugish on our test system. In fairness our test system is not very speedy and does not have a lot of ram.
features include:
- Tree View synchronized with Node Text View for quick editing of node names and values.
- Incremental search (Ctrl+I) in both tree and text views, so as you type it navigates to matching nodes.
- Cut/copy/paste with full namespace support.
- Drag/drop support for easy manipulation of the tree, even across different instances of XML Notepad and from the file system.
- Infinite undo/redo for all edit operations.
- In place popup multi-line editing of large text node values.
- Configurable fonts and colors via the options dialog.
- Full find/replace dialog with support for regex and XPath.
- Good performance on large XML documents, loading a 3mb document in about one second.
- Instant XML schema validation while you edit with errors and warnings shown in the task list window.
- Intellisense based on expected elements and attributes and enumerated simple type values.
- Support for custom editors for date, dateTime and time datatypes and other types like color.
- Handy nudge tool bar buttons for quick movement of nodes up and down the tree.
- Inplace HTML viewer for processing xml-stylesheet processing instructions.
- Built-in XML Diff tool.
- Support for XInclude
- Dynamic help from XSD annotations.
- Goto definition to navigate includes and XSD schema information.
