text to xml to html

osio · 07-22-2005, 02:22 PM

I would like to write a text file with entries like:

title: task 1
date: 22/7/05
content: do this and that

title: task 2
date: 22/7/05
content: then this and also that

and keep on editing and adding entries and then convert it into a xml file and finally into a html one. The html files would convert the fields above to something like:

<h1>task 1</h1>
<h2>22/7/05</h2>
<p>do this and that</p>

I'm not familiar with perl or phyton but can use scripts based on them and I can cope with a little of bash scripting.
Is there any tool or program to do this?

rjlee · 07-22-2005, 06:19 PM

Perl ships with a module called CGI that semi-automates the process of writing out HTML. Type perldoc CGI into a terminal for more detailed instructions. (And perldoc perl if you want to start learning Perl programming!)

If you want to write (or parse) XML in some non-HTML format, I would use the XML::Twig Perl module. To install it, you can do this:

Code:

sudo perl -MCPAN -e shell
(the first time you run this, you will get a prompt asking if you're ready for manual configuration; type no)
cpan> install XML::Twig;
(wait until it's installed, then press Ctrl+D to exit back to the shell)

Also perldoc XML::Twig should give you some documentation.

osio · 07-28-2005, 11:45 AM

Thank you rjlee, I'll print and read the perldoc CGI, although it looks a bit too advanced for me.

keefaz · 07-28-2005, 11:49 AM

If your entries are stricly in the format from the example you posted
just some sed commands should be efficient though

osio · 07-28-2005, 12:16 PM

All right, so you mean something like
sed -i -e 's/^title/$\<\\h1\>\ -e 's/title:/\<h1\>/' ..........?
Then I insert a xml header and I'm done?

keefaz · 07-28-2005, 12:39 PM

You could use :

Code:

sed -i -e 's#title: \(.*\)#<h1>\1</h1>#g' \
-e 's#date: \(.*\)#<h2>\1</h2>#g' \
-e 's#content: \(.*\)#<p>\1</p>#g' filename

Note that -i overwrite your original file, I don't know if it is what you want