Small class to convert XML data to a dictionary

xmldict.py

from io import StringIO
from xml.etree.ElementTree import ElementTree, Element, parse, ParseError

class XMLDict(dict):
   '''A dictionary-like object to represent XML data.'''

   def __init__(self, xml=None):
      '''Expects a string containing XML data.'''
      try:
         self.populate(parse(StringIO(unicode(xml))).getroot())
      except ParseError as pe:
         raise TypeError('Invalid XML data: %s' % str(pe))
      except:
         raise TypeError('Unparsable XML type: %s' % type(xml).__name__)

   def populate(self, xml):
      self._name = xml.tag
      for attribute, value in xml.attrib.items():
         self[attribute] = value
      self._text = '' if xml.text is None else xml.text.strip()
      self._children = []
      for c in list(xml):
         # Recurse
         self.children.append(XMLDict(c))

   def __getattr__(self, key):
      try:
         return self[key]
      except KeyError:
         raise AttributeError("'%s' object has no attribute '%s'" %
                              (self.__class__.__name__, key))

   def __setattr__(self, key, value):
      self[key] = value

   def __str__(self):
      return self._name


if __name__ == '__main__':
   from pprint import pprint

   xml = u'''
   <container foo='a'>
      <a>
         <baz>some text</baz>
      </a>
      <b bar='attrib'>test string</b>
   </container>
   '''

   o = XMLDict(xml)
   pprint(o)