Python SVG parser
Getting the d-string can be done in a line or two using svgpathtools.
from svgpathtools import svg2paths
paths, attributes = svg2paths('some_svg_file.svg')
paths is a list of svgpathtools Path objects (containing just the curve info, no colors, styles, etc.). attributes is a list of corresponding dictionary objects storing the attributes of each path.
To, say, print out the d-strings then...
for k, v in enumerate(attributes):
print(v['d']) # print d-string of k-th path in SVG
Ignoring transforms, you can extract the path strings from an SVG like so:
from xml.dom import minidom
doc = minidom.parse(svg_file) # parseString also exists
path_strings = [path.getAttribute('d') for path
in doc.getElementsByTagName('path')]
doc.unlink()