Indentation and new line command for XMLwriter in C#

Question

I am writing some data to XML file...but when I open it all the values are in a single line...how can write it in readable format?ie each node in new line and indentation?

Answer 1

Check the Settings property:

w.Settings.Indent = true;

Edit: You can't set it directly:

System.Xml.XmlWriter.Create("path", new System.Xml.XmlWriterSettings())

Answer 2

You need to first create an XmlWriterSettings object that specifies your indentation, then when creating your XmlWriter, pass in the XmlWriterSettings after your path.

Additionally, I use the using block to let C# handle the disposing of my resources so that I don't need to worry about losing any resources on an exception.

{
  XmlWriterSettings xmlWriterSettings = new XmlWriterSettings()
  {
    Indent = true,
    IndentChars = "\t",
    NewLineOnAttributes = true
  };

  using (XmlWriter w= XmlWriter.Create("myfile.xml", xmlWriterSettings))
  {
    w.WriteStartDocument();
    w.WriteStartElement("myfile");

    w.WriteElementString("id", id.Text);
    w.WriteElementString("date", dateTimePicker1.Text);
    w.WriteElementString("version", ver.Text);
    w.WriteEndElement();
    w.WriteEndDocument();
  }
}

Answer 3

Set the Formatting Property of the XmlTextWriter:

TextWriter textWriter;
var xmlTextWriter = new XmlTextWriter(textWriter);
xmlTextWriter.Formatting = Formatting.Indented;

Answer 4

Use a XmlTextWriter instead of XmlWriter and then set the Indentation properties.

Example

string filename = "MyFile.xml";

using (FileStream fileStream = new FileStream(filename, FileMode.Create))
using (StreamWriter sw = new StreamWriter(fileStream))
using (XmlTextWriter xmlWriter = new XmlTextWriter(sw))
{
  xmlWriter.Formatting = Formatting.Indented;
  xmlWriter.Indentation = 4;

  // ... Write elements
}

Following @jumbo comment, this could also be implemented like in .NET 2.

var filename = "MyFile.xml";
var settings = new XmlWriterSettings() 
{
    Indent = true,
    IndentChars = "    "
}

using (var w = XmlWriter.Create(filename, settings))
{
    // ... Write elements
}

Answer 5

Use Settings As follow:

        XmlWriterSettings settings = new XmlWriterSettings();
        settings.Encoding = Encoding.UTF8;
        settings.Indent = true;

        using (MemoryStream memoryStream = new MemoryStream())
        using (XmlWriter xmlDoc = XmlWriter.Create(memoryStream, settings)){
         // logic here..
        }

This will get you where you want, though, you don't have to use MemoryStream, the importent part is the settings.

Answer 6

A little VB.NET version using XmlWriter plus XmlWriterSettings direct to file:

Dim oSerializer As New XmlSerializer(GetType(MyType), New XmlRootAttribute("MyRootAttributeName"))
Using oXmlWriter As XmlWriter = XmlWriter.Create("MyFilePath", New XmlWriterSettings With {.Indent = True}) //Default encoding is utf-8
    oSerializer.Serialize(oXmlWriter, oInstanceOfMyType)
    oXmlWriter.Flush()
End Using

Check the doco for other settings and file overwrite options but this is clean and works as expected in lots of situations.