From: slothbear <farbot@...>
Date: 2007-07-17T10:45:02+09:00
Subject: xmlsimple: prevent folding multiple elements into array?

I have some xml that represents a somewhat weirdly formed hash.
XmlSimple is eating some of my structure.

INPUT:
<kern>
	<map>
		<key>
			state
		</key>
		<string>
			open
		</string>
		<key>
			rate
		</key>
		<time>
			daily
		</time>
		<key>
			duration
		</key>
		<time>
			monthly
		</time>
	</map>
</kern>

XmlSimple.xml_in(xml, {'ForceArray'=>false})

OUTPUT:
{"map"=> {
    "time"=>["daily", "monthly"],
     "key"=>["state", "rate", "duration"],
     "string"=>"open"
     }
}

With the arrays folded that way, there's no way for me to tell that
the value of "state" is "open".  I don't really care about the
"datatypes".  I'm aiming at a single level hash something like this:

DESIRED:
{"map"=> {
     "state" => "open,
     "rate" => "daily",
     "duration" => "monthly"
     }
}

I can't really change the odd incoming XML, but I'm happy to process
any Ruby data structure that hasn't lost some of my order/structure.
All of the options around folding appear to affect only attributes,
but I have only elements.