How can I convert XML into a Python object?

Question

I need to load an XML file and convert the contents into an object-oriented Python structure. I want to take this:

Answer 1

#@Stephen: 
#"can't hardcode the element names, so I need to collect them 
#at parse and use them somehow as the object names."

#I don't think thats possible. Instead you can do this. 
#this will help you getting any object with a required name.

import BeautifulSoup


class Coll(object):
    """A class which can hold your Foo clas objects 
    and retrieve them easily when you want
    abstracting the storage and retrieval logic
    """
    def __init__(self):
        self.foos={}        

    def add(self, fooobj):
        self.foos[fooobj.name]=fooobj

    def get(self, name):
        return self.foos[name]

class Foo(object):
    """The required class
    """
    def __init__(self, name, attr1=None, attr2=None):
        self.name=name
        self.attr1=attr1
        self.attr2=attr2

s="""

         
         
     
"""

#

soup=BeautifulSoup.BeautifulSoup(s)


bars=Coll()
for each in soup.findAll('object'):
    bar=Foo(each['name'])
    attrs=each.findAll('attr')
    for attr in attrs:
        setattr(bar, attr['name'], attr.renderContents())
    bars.add(bar)


#retrieve objects by name
print bars.get('somename').__dict__

print '\n\n', bars.get('someothername').__dict__

output

{'attr2': 'value2', 'name': u'somename', 'attr1': 'value1'}


{'attr2': 'value4', 'name': u'someothername', 'attr1': 'value3'}