Parsing XML Using Regular Expression

Question

I'm writing a program in VB using Visual Studio 2010. I need to get info out of XML file, but due to some other issue, I can't use XmlDocument, so I'm trying to use Regular Expression instead.

I have a word document in xml format. (Basically, just open MS word, type in "A" in one paragraph and "B" in the second paragraph, save as Word 2003 XML Document)

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<?mso-application progid="Word.Document"?>
<w:wordDocument xmlns:aml="http://schemas.microsoft.com/aml/2001/core" xmlns:wpc="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/word/2010/wordprocessingCanvas" xmlns:dt="uuid:C2F41010-65B3-11d1-A29F-00AA00C14882" xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006" xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:v="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml" xmlns:w10="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" xmlns:w="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/word/2003/wordml" xmlns:wx="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/word/2003/auxHint" xmlns:wne="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/word/2006/wordml" xmlns:wsp="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/word/2003/wordml/sp2" xmlns:sl="http://schemas.microsoft.com/schemaLibrary/2003/core" w:macrosPresent="no" w:embeddedObjPresent="no" w:ocxPresent="no" xml:space="preserve">
<w:ignoreSubtree w:val="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/word/2003/wordml/sp2"/>
<o:DocumentProperties>
<o:Author>student</o:Author>
<o:LastAuthor>student</o:LastAuthor>
<o:Revision>1</o:Revision>
<o:TotalTime>1</o:TotalTime>
<o:Created>2014-12-02T14:59:00Z</o:Created>
<o:LastSaved>2014-12-02T15:00:00Z</o:LastSaved>
<o:Pages>1</o:Pages>
<o:Words>0</o:Words>
<o:Characters>3</o:Characters>
<o:Lines>1</o:Lines>
<o:Paragraphs>1</o:Paragraphs>
<o:CharactersWithSpaces>3</o:CharactersWithSpaces>
<o:Version>14</o:Version>
</o:DocumentProperties>
<w:fonts>
<w:defaultFonts w:ascii="Calibri" w:fareast="新細明體" w:h-ansi="Calibri" w:cs="Times New Roman"/>
<w:font w:name="Times New Roman">
<w:panose-1 w:val="02020603050405020304"/>
<w:charset w:val="00"/>
<w:family w:val="Roman"/>
<w:pitch w:val="variable"/>
<w:sig w:usb-0="E0002AFF" w:usb-1="C0007841" w:usb-2="00000009" w:usb-3="00000000" w:csb-0="000001FF" w:csb-1="00000000"/>
</w:font>
<w:font w:name="新細明體">
<w:altName w:val="PMingLiU"/>
<w:panose-1 w:val="02020500000000000000"/>
<w:charset w:val="88"/>
<w:family w:val="Roman"/>
<w:pitch w:val="variable"/>
<w:sig w:usb-0="A00002FF" w:usb-1="28CFFCFA" w:usb-2="00000016" w:usb-3="00000000" w:csb-0="00100001" w:csb-1="00000000"/>
</w:font>
<w:font w:name="Cambria Math">
<w:panose-1 w:val="02040503050406030204"/>
<w:charset w:val="01"/>
<w:family w:val="Roman"/>
<w:notTrueType/>
<w:pitch w:val="variable"/>
</w:font>
<w:font w:name="Calibri">
<w:panose-1 w:val="020F0502020204030204"/>
<w:charset w:val="00"/>
<w:family w:val="Swiss"/>
<w:pitch w:val="variable"/>
<w:sig w:usb-0="E00002FF" w:usb-1="4000ACFF" w:usb-2="00000001" w:usb-3="00000000" w:csb-0="0000019F" w:csb-1="00000000"/>
</w:font>
<w:font w:name="@新細明體">
<w:panose-1 w:val="02020500000000000000"/>
<w:charset w:val="88"/>
<w:family w:val="Roman"/>
<w:pitch w:val="variable"/>
<w:sig w:usb-0="A00002FF" w:usb-1="28CFFCFA" w:usb-2="00000016" w:usb-3="00000000" w:csb-0="00100001" w:csb-1="00000000"/>
</w:font>
</w:fonts>
<w:styles>
<w:versionOfBuiltInStylenames w:val="7"/>
<w:latentStyles w:defLockedState="off" w:latentStyleCount="267">
<w:lsdException w:name="Normal"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 7"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 8"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="heading 9"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 7"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 8"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="toc 9"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="caption"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Title"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Default Paragraph Font"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Subtitle"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Strong"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Emphasis"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Table Grid"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Placeholder Text"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="No Spacing"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Shading"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light List"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Grid"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Dark List"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Shading"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful List"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Grid"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Shading Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light List Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Grid Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Revision"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="List Paragraph"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Quote"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Intense Quote"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Dark List Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Shading Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful List Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Grid Accent 1"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Shading Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light List Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Grid Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 1 Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Dark List Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Shading Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful List Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Grid Accent 2"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Shading Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light List Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Grid Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 1 Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Dark List Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Shading Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful List Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Grid Accent 3"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Shading Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light List Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Grid Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 1 Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 2 Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Dark List Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Shading Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful List Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Grid Accent 4"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Shading Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light List Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Grid Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 1 Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 2 Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Dark List Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Shading Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful List Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Grid Accent 5"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Shading Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light List Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Light Grid Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium List 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Dark List Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Shading Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful List Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Colorful Grid Accent 6"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Subtle Emphasis"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Intense Emphasis"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Subtle Reference"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Intense Reference"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Book Title"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="Bibliography"/>
<w:lsdException w:name="TOC Heading"/>
</w:latentStyles>
<w:style w:type="paragraph" w:default="on" w:styleId="Normal">
<w:name w:val="Normal"/>
<w:pPr>
<w:spacing w:after="200" w:line="276" w:line-rule="auto"/>
</w:pPr>
<w:rPr>
<wx:font wx:val="Calibri"/>
<w:sz w:val="22"/>
<w:sz-cs w:val="22"/>
<w:lang w:val="EN-US" w:fareast="ZH-TW" w:bidi="AR-SA"/>
</w:rPr>
</w:style>
<w:style w:type="character" w:default="on" w:styleId="DefaultParagraphFont">
<w:name w:val="Default Paragraph Font"/>
</w:style>
<w:style w:type="table" w:default="on" w:styleId="TableNormal">
<w:name w:val="Normal Table"/>
<wx:uiName wx:val="Table Normal"/>
<w:rPr>
<wx:font wx:val="Calibri"/>
<w:lang w:val="EN-US" w:fareast="ZH-TW" w:bidi="AR-SA"/>
</w:rPr>
<w:tblPr>
<w:tblInd w:w="0" w:type="dxa"/>
<w:tblCellMar>
<w:top w:w="0" w:type="dxa"/>
<w:left w:w="108" w:type="dxa"/>
<w:bottom w:w="0" w:type="dxa"/>
<w:right w:w="108" w:type="dxa"/>
</w:tblCellMar>
</w:tblPr>
</w:style>
<w:style w:type="list" w:default="on" w:styleId="NoList">
<w:name w:val="No List"/>
</w:style>
</w:styles>
<w:shapeDefaults>
<o:shapedefaults v:ext="edit" spidmax="1026"/>
<o:shapelayout v:ext="edit">
<o:idmap v:ext="edit" data="1"/>
</o:shapelayout>
</w:shapeDefaults>
<w:docPr>
<w:view w:val="print"/>
<w:zoom w:percent="100"/>
<w:doNotEmbedSystemFonts/>
<w:proofState w:spelling="clean" w:grammar="clean"/>
<w:defaultTabStop w:val="720"/>
<w:punctuationKerning/>
<w:characterSpacingControl w:val="DontCompress"/>
<w:optimizeForBrowser/>
<w:allowPNG/>
<w:validateAgainstSchema/>
<w:saveInvalidXML w:val="off"/>
<w:ignoreMixedContent w:val="off"/>
<w:alwaysShowPlaceholderText w:val="off"/>
<w:compat>
<w:breakWrappedTables/>
<w:snapToGridInCell/>
<w:wrapTextWithPunct/>
<w:useAsianBreakRules/>
<w:dontGrowAutofit/>
<w:useFELayout/>
</w:compat>
<wsp:rsids>
<wsp:rsidRoot wsp:val="00903623"/>
<wsp:rsid wsp:val="00903623"/>
<wsp:rsid wsp:val="00AB3ECB"/>
</wsp:rsids>
</w:docPr>
<w:body>
<wx:sect>
<w:p wsp:rsidR="00AB3ECB" wsp:rsidRDefault="00903623">
<w:r>
<w:t>A</w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>
<w:p wsp:rsidR="00903623" wsp:rsidRDefault="00903623">
<w:r>
<w:t>B</w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>
<w:sectPr wsp:rsidR="00903623">
<w:pgSz w:w="12240" w:h="15840"/>
<w:pgMar w:top="1440" w:right="1440" w:bottom="1440" w:left="1440" w:header="720" w:footer="720" w:gutter="0"/>
<w:cols w:space="720"/>
<w:docGrid w:line-pitch="360"/>
</w:sectPr>
</wx:sect>
</w:body>
</w:wordDocument>

I'm trying to get the node that represent the whole paragraph, which is this part

<w:p wsp:rsidR="00AB3ECB" wsp:rsidRDefault="00903623">
<w:r>
<w:t>A</w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>

My regex pattern is <w:p(\s|).*?>.*?<w:t>(.*?)</w:t>.*?</w:p>, and it's returning a huge string starting from <w:panose-1 w:val="02040503050406030204"/>, which is not what I want, I only need the short 5 lines.

How can I modify my regex pattern to get the correct string?

Note: this is a simplified xml I created for testing, in the actual document, the open tag for <w:p> can be with or without attributes, that is why I added (\s|) in the pattern. And the important part is just the <w:p> and <w:t> so I didn't even try to worry about other tags

Note: I'm using Regex Hero to test my pattern

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8577060/why-is-it-such-a-bad-idea-to-parse-xml-with-regex — Jeremy, Dec 02 '14 at 15:32
@Jeremy I had tried loading it into XmlDocument, but I'm getting an error while loading, because of the prefix in the tags I think. My colleague mentioned that the xml file cannot be loaded into XmlDocument because it is not standard xml — sora0419, Dec 02 '14 at 15:41
take a look at http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7799276/parsing-a-ms-word-generated-xml-file-in-c-sharp to see if that helps. You have to add namespaces to the xml doc. — Jeremy, Dec 02 '14 at 16:12
Those are namespace prefixes and are indeed a proper part of standard XML. Please take @Jeremy's advice and change course. You're in the weeds. — kjhughes, Dec 02 '14 at 16:15

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Dec 02 '14 at 15:36

3

You don't have just one line-break but more. . is just recognizing symbols, but no white-spaces, line-breaks or things like those. Additional to that, when you use the * then you don't need a ? anymore.

So a valid rule for your example would be: <w:p (.|\s)*<w:t>(.|\s)*</w:p>

answered Dec 02 '14 at 15:36

Mainz007

533
5
16

1

the xml string I'm loading in actually has no line-break, so that's not an issue. I tried your pattern, it is giving me A and B as one group, I will need them in two separate groups, is this possible? – sora0419 Dec 02 '14 at 15:45
1

and FYI, I will need to get the "A" and the "B", so I think I will still need (.*?) somewhere in my pattern – sora0419 Dec 02 '14 at 15:47

Parsing XML Using Regular Expression

1 Answers1