How do I set attributes for an XML element with Python?
You can specify attributes for an Element
or SubElement
during creation with keyword arguments.
import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET
root = ET.Element('Summary')
ET.SubElement(root, 'TextSummary', Status='Completed')
XML:
<Summary>
<TextSummary Status="Completed"/>
</Summary>
Alternatively, you can use .set
to add attributes to an existing element.
import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET
root = ET.Element('Summary')
sub = ET.SubElement(root, 'TextSummary')
sub.set('Status', 'Completed')
XML:
<Summary>
<TextSummary Status="Completed"/>
</Summary>
Technical Explanation:
The constructors for Element
and SubElement
include **extra
, which accepts attributes as keyword arguments.
xml.etree.ElementTree.Element(tag, attrib={}, **extra)
xml.etree.ElementTree.SubElement(parent, tag, attrib={}, **extra)
This allows you to add an arbitrary number of attributes.
root = ET.Element('Summary', Date='2018/07/02', Timestamp='11:44am')
# <Summary Date = "2018/07/02" Timestamp = "11:44am">
You can also use use .set
to add attributes to a pre-existing element. However, this can only add one element at a time. (As suggested by Thomas Orozco).
root = ET.Element('Summary')
root.set('Date', '2018/07/02')
root.set('Timestamp', '11:44am')
# <Summary Date = "2018/07/02" Timestamp = "11:44am">
Full Example:
import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET
root = ET.Element('school', name='Willow Creek High')
ET.SubElement(root, 'student', name='Jane Doe', grade='9')
print(ET.tostring(root).decode())
# <school name="Willow Creek High"><student grade="9" name="Jane Doe" /></school>
You should be doing:
ET.SubElement(root,'TextSummary').set('Status','Completed')
The Etree documentation shows usage.