Is it possible to create XML files in NPrinting?

[Marijn]

Hi all,

I wonder whether it's possible to create an XML file from NPrinting. A client expects us to deliver data in an XML, so we made a pivot table with a single cell that has the whole XML text in it. Now I'd like to export this into an XML file, but I see that there's no option to export an XML in NPrinting. Does anyone have an idea for an approach?

Thanks in advance!

Marijn

[Frank_S]

HI @Marijn

Unfortunately, there is no XML output format available.
Below you will find a list of available formats to export your table information.

• Report output formats

Kind regards...

[Marijn]

Hi @Frank_S ,

Thanks for your reply, I'll try to find another solution then.

Kind regards,

Marijn

[Ruggero_Piccoli]

Hi,

As per @Frank_S 's answer, none of the available types of templates has .xml as a native output format. This could be added as a new feature request on the ideation page Suggest an Idea!

What you could try as a workaround is to create an HTML template, remove all pre-filled HTML code and insert one, or more, Qlik variables created in QlikView or in Qlik Sense that contain the XML code you need. The output will always be a .zip file with the HTML inside so you have to manage the unzip and file extension change outside Qlik NPrinting. I understand that it is not a good and linear solution, I did some tests but I was not able to find a better workaround.

Best Regards,

Ruggero

[Frank_S]

Hi @Marijn

If you use the csv export in the entity report/publish task, you can use an external source such as the link below to convert the csv output to xml. (use this external link at your discretion.)

https://www.zamzar.com/convert/csv-to-xml/

Otherwise you may consider as Ruggero suggested to insert an 'idea' on our feature request site at the link he shared.

Kind regards..

[Marijn · Accepted solution]

Hi @Frank_S and @Ruggero_Piccoli 

We've solved it by creating a single set expression that concatenates all values with the XML format. In this way, there is one field that contains the entire string that needs to become the XML file. I export this as a CSV, then use a .bat file with the command line to convert the file into an XML. The set expression looks something like this:

=chr(10)&
'xmlstatement'&chr(10)&
'<XMLfile>'&chr(10)&

concat(distinct {$<Flag={'xxx'}>}
  '<A>' & chr(10)&
     ' <A1>' & FIELD1 & ' </A1>' & chr(10)&
     ' <A2>' & FIELD2 & '</A2>' & chr(10) &
     ' <A3>' & FIELD3 & '</A3>' & chr(10) &
  '</A>' & chr(10)
)&
'</XMLfile>' & chr(10)

[Frank_S]

Thank you for sharing your solution!

[Ruggero_Piccoli]

Hi @Marijn ,

Thanks a lot for sharing the solution: it can be useful for other readers.

I have not tested but, maybe, you can do something similar by creating an html template and starting by removing the pre-filled html tags. Then use a .bat to change the generated files extension.

Best Regards,

Ruggero