XmlTools

Online Documentation

This packages purpose is to correct invalid Xml files where enumeration restrictions or Xml date format masks are violated. It's intended to make working with code generated from Xml schemas easier.

While it can be used dynamically (see XmlTools.Tests.CodeGenerator.SchemaCorrectorHelper for dynamically generating the code, compiling in-memory with Roslyn and then working with this code), it's main use case is to auto generate code that is then used to sanitize incoming Xml.

Features are currently limited to correcting Xml enumeration restrictions, fixing invalid Xsd decimals and repairing or removing invalid Xml date elements. Both attributes and elements are supported. When an invalid enumeration value is encountered, it is either deleted if it's not valid at all or case corrected if the casing is off.

CLI Options

Parameter	Description
-i, --input	Relative or absolute path to an Xml schema file
-o, --output	Relative or absolute path to the output file
-n, --namespace	Namespace for the generated class
-f, --flatten	If enabled, groups will be flattened
-s, --specific-groups	If specified in combination with the 'flatten' option, only groups with the given names will be flattened
-m, --merge	If enabled, the schema will be merged
--help	Shows help

Flattening

Flattening means that Xsd group and attributeGroup elements are rebuilt so that the elements within are directly defined where previously only the group reference would be used.

Merging

When merging Xsd schemas, other schema files that are referenced are loaded and will be embedded directly in the original. This only works for file-path references, Urls will not be resolved.

Using the XmlTools.Console app to create validation code

With the package available in the local NuGet cache, you need to create two files:

codegen.bat

    Powershell.exe -executionpolicy remotesigned -File  "%~dp0\codegen.ps1" Schema\MySchema.xsd Schema\MySchemaCorrector.cs MyNamespace

codegen.ps1

param([string]$inputPath, [string]$outputPath, [string]$namespace)
# Find the latest version of the XmlTools.Console app
$xmlToolPackages = Join-Path -Path $env:USERPROFILE -ChildPath "\.nuget\packages\XmlTools.Console"
$latestXmlToolConsoleApp = Join-Path -Path ((Get-ChildItem -Path $xmlToolPackages | Sort-Object Fullname -Descending)[0].FullName) -ChildPath "tools\net461\XmlTools.Console.exe"
# Call the tool to make the conversion
& $latestXmlToolConsoleApp -i $inputPath -o $outputPath -n $namespace

Specify the input schema, output code file and the namespace in the batch file and call it whenever you want to recreate your code.

Main classes

There's the XmlSchemaParser in XmlTools.Parser to read Xml schemas and then there's the XmlSchemaCorrectorGenerator in XmlTools.CodeGenerator to create validation code.

Flattener

The function of the XmlTools.GroupFlattener.Flattener is to flatten or unroll groups. Many Xml tools have trouble with resolving circular group references, so this is an easy way to fix this while still preserving the schema. In addition, it makes sure that any elements of type xs:key will have their unique naming restored.

The group flattener supports an optional argument of type List<string> to only flatten groups with the given names. This is sometimes useful to only flatten groups that resolve to a circular reference, which may cause errors with some Xsd-to-Code generators.