XML_PP(1p)

📦
version 3.54 · 6 versions
, in ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

💖 xml_pp — the pretty-printer era 💖

okay bestie, so this is XML_PP(1p), from the User Contributed Perl Documentation section, and it's literally the glow-up your ugly XML has been begging for. no cap. 🦋

✨ NAME ✨

xml_pp — xml pretty-printer. that's it, that's the name, and it ate. 💅

✨ SYNOPSYS ✨

xml_pp [options] [<files>]

(yes the section is spelled like that, i'm not fixing it, it's iconic 🙈)

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

so basically? XML pretty printer using XML::Twig. it takes your crusty unreadable XML and makes it serve main character energy ✨

✨ OPTIONS ✨

  • -i[<extension>] — edits the file(s) in place 🫶. if you give it an extension (and there is no space between -i and the extension, okay? none. zero. zip.) then the original file gets backed-up with that extension. the rules for the extension are the same as Perl's (see perldoc perlrun): if the extension includes no * then it is appended to the original file name; if the extension does contain one or more * characters, then each * is replaced with the current filename. slay.
  • -s <style> — the style to use for pretty printing: none, nsgmls, nice, indented, record, or record_c (go check the XML::Twig docs for the exact description of those styles, i'm just the messenger 💜). default is indented, because of course it is.
  • -p <tag(s)> — preserves white spaces in tags. you can stack several -p options or just quote the tags if you need more than one. whatever vibes, bestie 🎀
  • -e <encoding> — use XML::Twig output_encoding (based on Text::Iconv or Unicode::Map8 and Unicode::String) to set the output encoding. by default the original encoding is preserved, no notes. if you use this option the XML declaration is updated (and created if there was none) ✨
make sure that the encoding is supported by the parser you use if you want to be able to process the pretty_printed file (XML::Parser does not support latin1 for example, you have to use iso-8859-1). fr fr, this one bites people.
  • -l — loads the documents in memory instead of outputting them as they are being parsed. this prevents a bug (see BUGS) but uses more memory. trade-offs, babe 💀
  • -f <file> — read the list of files to process from <file>, one per line 📋
  • -v — verbose (list the current file being processed). she's chatty and we love her 🗣️
  • -- — stop argument processing (to process files that start with -) 🛑
  • -h — display help. bestie behaviour 🙋‍♀️

🌈 EXAMPLES 🌈

xml_pp foo.xml > foo_pp.xml           # pretty print foo.xml
xml_pp < foo.xml > foo_pp.xml         # pretty print from standard input

xml_pp -v -i.bak *.xml                # pretty print .xml files, with backups
xml_pp -v -i'orig_*' *.xml            # backups are named orig_<filename>

xml_pp -i -p pre foo.xhtml            # preserve spaces in pre tags

xml_pp -i.bak -p 'pre code' foo.xml   # preserve spaces in pre and code tags
xml_pp -i.bak -p pre -p code foo.xml  # same

xml_pp -i -s record mydb_export.xml   # pretty print using the record style

xml_pp -e utf8 -i foo.xml             # output will be in utf8
xml_pp -e iso-8859-1 -i foo.xml       # output will be in iso-8859-1

xml_pp -v -i.bak -f lof               # pretty print in place files from lof

xml_pp -- -i.xml                      # pretty print the -i.xml file

xml_pp -l foo.xml                     # loads the entire file in memory
                                      # before pretty printing it

xml_pp -h                             # display help

look at her go 😭👑 every single one of these is a serve.

💀 BUGS 💀

okay so here's the tea. elements with mixed content that start with an embedded element get an extra \n. not me exposing the flaw—

<elt><b>b</b>toto<b>bold</b></elt>

will be output as

<elt>
  <b>b</b>toto<b>bold</b></elt>

using the -l option solves this bug (but uses more memory). so like, pick your struggle 🫠

📝 TODO 📝

  • update XML::Twig to use Encode with perl 5.8.0 — manifesting this one for her 🙏✨

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Michel Rodriguez <mirod@xmltwig.com> — the icon, the legend, the moment 💜

perl v5.40.1 🦋 2025-12-18 🎀 — and that's the whole page bestie, go forth and pretty-print, you're gonna eat 💅✨🫶

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