How to Sort XML File by Tag Content in Python Using ElementTree

Learn how to sort an XML file by tag content, with a focus on ordering `users` by their IDs, using Python’s ElementTree library.
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Sort XML File by Tag Content in Python

The Problem

Suppose you have an XML file structured as follows:

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In this XML snippet, you have multiple user records defined by the <user> tag. Each user has an <id> and a <name>. However, these users are not sorted by the <id> tag, which may be crucial for later processing or display.

Desired Output

Your goal is to sort these users by their <id> value, so the XML looks like this after sorting:

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The Solution

Step-by-Step Code Explanation

Import the Required Library: First, you need to import the ElementTree module.

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Load Your XML Data: This is done by creating a string representation of the XML or reading from an XML file.

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Parse the XML String: You convert the XML string into an ElementTree object that can be manipulated.

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Find All Users: Use the findall method to get a list of user elements from the root.

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Remove Existing Users: Create a copy of the user list and then remove the users from the root. This will allow us to append the sorted users later.

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Sort the Users: Perform the sorting based on the user <id> tag using a lambda function.

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Re-append Sorted Users: Finally, iterate through the sorted user list and append them back to the root.

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Output the Result: You can use ET.dump() to display the sorted XML structure.

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Complete Code Example

Here’s the complete code snippet:

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Output

The output after running the above code will be:

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Conclusion