From: James Britt <jamesUNDERBARb@...>
Date: 2004-09-03T15:15:07+09:00
Subject: Re: rexml help

Daniel Berger wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> 
> Given a name, I want to be able to grab the login and password.  Or,
> given both a name and a login, I want to be able to find the password.
>  In the event I am only given a name, and there is more than one entry
> with that name, I want the first entry (from a top down perspective).
> 
> What is the shortest route to accomplish this with rexml?  I've been
> futzing around with each, each_element, root, get_text - but I'm just
> not quite getting the hang of it.
> 


Play with this::

#------------------------------------------------------------
class REXML::Document
   def login_details( name )
     ary = self.elements.to_a( "//name[text()='#{name}']" )
     parent  = ary[0].parent
     login = parent.elements.to_a( "login" )[0].text
     pwd = parent.elements.to_a( "password" )[0].text
     [login, pwd ]
   end
end

doc = REXML::Document.new( xml )

puts( doc.login_details( 'bar' ).inspect )
puts( doc.login_details( 'foo' ).inspect )

#------------------------------------------------------------


REXML + XPath is your friend.  Basically, use XPath to select the 
node(s) you want.  Then get the parent node.  Then use XPath again to 
get additional child nodes from that (parent) node.


James