How to get xpath from an XmlNode instance

Question

Could someone supply some code that would get the xpath of a System.Xml.XmlNode instance?

Thanks!

Answer 1

What about using class extension ? ;) My version (building on others work) uses the syntaxe name[index]... with index omited is element has no "brothers". The loop to get the element index is outside in an independant routine (also a class extension).

Just past the following in any utility class (or in the main Program class)

static public int GetRank( this XmlNode node )
{
    // return 0 if unique, else return position 1...n in siblings with same name
    try
    {
        if( node is XmlElement ) 
        {
            int rank = 1;
            bool alone = true, found = false;

            foreach( XmlNode n in node.ParentNode.ChildNodes )
                if( n.Name == node.Name ) // sibling with same name
                {
                    if( n.Equals(node) )
                    {
                        if( ! alone ) return rank; // no need to continue
                        found = true;
                    }
                    else
                    {
                        if( found ) return rank; // no need to continue
                        alone = false;
                        rank++;
                    }
                }

        }
    }
    catch{}
    return 0;
}

static public string GetXPath( this XmlNode node )
{
    try
    {
        if( node is XmlAttribute )
            return String.Format( "{0}/@{1}", (node as XmlAttribute).OwnerElement.GetXPath(), node.Name );

        if( node is XmlText || node is XmlCDataSection )
            return node.ParentNode.GetXPath();

        if( node.ParentNode == null )   // the only node with no parent is the root node, which has no path
            return "";

        int rank = node.GetRank();
        if( rank == 0 ) return String.Format( "{0}/{1}",        node.ParentNode.GetXPath(), node.Name );
        else            return String.Format( "{0}/{1}[{2}]",   node.ParentNode.GetXPath(), node.Name, rank );
    }
    catch{}
    return "";
}