Import XML files to PostgreSQL

Question

I do have a lot of XML files I would like to import in the table xml_data:

create table xml_data(result xml);

To do this I hav

Answer 1

I would try a different approach: read the XML file directly into variable inside a plpgsql function and proceed from there. Should be a lot faster and a lot more robust.

CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION f_sync_from_xml()
  RETURNS boolean AS
$BODY$
DECLARE
    myxml    xml;
    datafile text := 'path/to/my_file.xml';
BEGIN
   myxml := pg_read_file(datafile, 0, 100000000);  -- arbitrary 100 MB max.

   CREATE TEMP TABLE tmp AS
   SELECT (xpath('//some_id/text()', x))[1]::text AS id
   FROM   unnest(xpath('/xml/path/to/datum', myxml)) x;
   ...

You need superuser privileges, and file must be local to the DB server, in an accessible directory.
Complete code example with more explanation and links:

• XML data to PostgreSQL database