Deprecated feature: Transforming character-delimited text to XML
You can transform data within your input file from a character-delimited format, such as comma-separated value (CSV), to an XML data format that the mass loading utilities expect.
Procedure
- Create a character-delimited format file that contains the data you want to transform.
-
Create an XML schema file in a text editor that defines how the character-delimited format file
maps to an XML file.
Use the following tags and attributes when you create your XML schema file:
- DataType
- Enter a description of the data format of your character-delimited format
- RecordDescription
- This tag describes the structure of your character-delimited format file. This tag uses the
following attributes to define the file structure:
- FieldSeparator
- This attribute specifies the character or characters that separate fields in the character-delimited format file.
- RecordSeparator
- This attribute specifies the character or characters that separate records in the
character-delimited format file.
Use decimal numerical Unicode entities for special characters, for example, enter a line feed or new line (\n) as


and a carriage return (\r) as
. - StringDelimiter
- This attribute specifies the character or characters that enclose each field in a record in your character-delimited format file.
- HeaderIncluded
-
- false
- The character-delimited format file does not contain a header line that indicates the field names.
- true
- The character-delimited format file contains a header line that indicates the field names.
- HeaderLines
- This attribute specifies the number of records at the start of the character-delimited format file, as separated by the RecordSeparator, that are not to be considered as data. These lines are not converted to XML.
- ElementName
- This attribute defines the root element for each record.
- FieldDescription
- This element describes a field in the records in your character-delimited format file. There
must be one FieldDescription element for each field in your character-delimited format file. This
element uses the following attributes to define each field:
- FieldName
- This attribute defines the name of the field. This attribute is used as a child element.
- FieldPosition
- This attribute indicates the position of this field in a record. The first field in a record is in field position 1.
Save your file as an XML file. This file is not an XSD file.
-
Create the parameters file.
The order of the values in the parameters file is important. The parameters must be separated by commas and appear in the file in the following order:
- Input file
- Name of the character-delimited variable format file to be transformed.
- Schema file
- Name of the XML schema file to be used in the transformation.
- Output file
- Name for the output XML file in which the transformed data is stored.
- Transformation method
- Method to be used in adding the data to the output file. The following methods are valid:
- Create
- Create an XML file from the text file.
- Append
- Append new XML data to an existing XML file.
- Encoding
- The character encoding scheme of the input file. Any character encoding scheme that is supported
by Java can be specified, for example
sample.csv,sample_schema.xml,catalog.xml,Create,UTF8
This parameter file tells the txtransform utility to create a new XML file (catalog.xml) from a UTF-8 encoded comma-separated value (CSV) file (sample.csv) using the schema that is defined in an XML schema file (sample_schema.xml).
- Run the txttransform utility.
Results
Based on the example XML schema file, each record has the following XML structure:
<category>
<categoryName>Category_name_value</categoryName>
<markforDelete>Marked_for_delete_value</markforDelete>
<field1> field1_value</field1>
<field2> field2_value</field2>
</category>