My original data is genealogical data in GEDCOM format. GEDCOM is a well-documented standard, yet every GEDCOM-able software creates files that, in one way or another, violate that standard. My idea is to create an intermediate form which can be converted to and from all involved 3rd party GEDCOM styles. I chose XML because GEDCOM is a tree structure, and I thought it is better to use existing tools for manipulating trees than to re-invent them.

Yes, I know there is a Gedcom package on CPAN, but it cannot read 5 out of 9 test files, and does not handle character sets correctly.

I want to use XPath expressions to locate the nodes which must be modified, then modify them as required, then save the tree to an XML file. I don't mind saving the unmodified XML tree to an intermediate file if I must. But then, using XPath to locate a node, how do I do my modification? This may include renaming the node's type, changing the text, moving the node up in the tree, or creating subnodes. Are XML and XPath the wrong tools? Maybe I'll have to create my own code to locate nodes, rather than using XPath?

In reply to Re^2: How to create XML tree from non-XML source by H4
in thread How to create XML tree from non-XML source by H4

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