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Python - implementing Preserving XML Namespace During ElementTree Parsing

👀 Views: 0 đŸ’Ŧ Answers: 1 📅 Created: 2025-06-12
xml elementtree namespace Python

I'm upgrading from an older version and Could someone explain I'm stuck on something that should probably be simple. I'm currently working with an scenario while parsing an XML file using Python's ElementTree. My XML file uses namespaces extensively, and I need to ensure that the namespaces are preserved during parsing. However, when I attempt to extract elements with namespaces, they seem to be lost or not recognized correctly. Here's a snippet of my XML: ```xml <root xmlns:ns="http://example.com/ns"> <ns:item>Item 1</ns:item> <ns:item>Item 2</ns:item> </root> ``` When I try to access the `item` elements using the following code: ```python import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET ns = {'ns': 'http://example.com/ns'} tree = ET.parse('myfile.xml') root = tree.getroot() items = root.findall('ns:item', ns) ``` I expect to get a list of items, but instead, I'm experiencing an empty list (`[]`) for `items`. I've verified that the XML structure is correct and that the namespace is specified properly in the `ns` dictionary. I've also tried using `root.find()` instead of `findall()`, but I still encounter the same scenario. I suspect that there might be a question with how I'm defining the namespaces or how I'm trying to access the elements. I would appreciate any insights on how to correctly handle XML namespaces with ElementTree in Python. I'm using Python 3.8.10 and the standard library's ElementTree module. Thanks in advance for your help! I'm working on a service that needs to handle this. Any help would be greatly appreciated! The project is a desktop app built with Python. The stack includes Python and several other technologies. Could someone point me to the right documentation? I'm working on a desktop app that needs to handle this.