XML data to PostgreSQL database [closed]

I have a working implementation where I do everything inside PostgreSQL without additional libraries.

Auxiliary parsing function

CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION f_xml_extract_val(text, xml)
  RETURNS text AS
$func$
SELECT CASE
        WHEN $1 ~ '@[[:alnum:]_]+$' THEN
           (xpath($1, $2))[1]
        WHEN $1 ~* '/text()$' THEN
           (xpath($1, $2))[1]
        WHEN $1 LIKE '%/' THEN
           (xpath($1 || 'text()', $2))[1]
        ELSE
           (xpath($1 || '/text()', $2))[1]
       END;
$func$  LANGUAGE sql IMMUTABLE;

Handle multiple values

The above implementation doesn’t handle multiple attributes at one xpath. Here is an overloaded version of f_xml_extract_val() for that. With the 3rd parameter you can pick one (the first), all or dist (distinct) values. Multiple values are aggregated to a comma-separated string.

CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION f_xml_extract_val(_path text, _node xml, _mode text)
  RETURNS text AS
$func$
DECLARE
   _xpath text := CASE
                   WHEN $1 ~~ '%/'              THEN $1 || 'text()'
                   WHEN lower($1) ~~ '%/text()' THEN $1
                   WHEN $1 ~ '@\w+$'            THEN $1
                   ELSE                              $1 || '/text()'
                  END;
BEGIN
   -- fetch one, all or distinct values
   CASE $3
       WHEN 'one'  THEN RETURN (xpath(_xpath, $2))[1]::text;
       WHEN 'all'  THEN RETURN array_to_string(xpath(_xpath, $2), ', ');
       WHEN 'dist' THEN RETURN array_to_string(ARRAY(
            SELECT DISTINCT unnest(xpath(_xpath, $2))::text ORDER BY 1), ', ');
       ELSE RAISE EXCEPTION
          'Invalid $3: >>%<<', $3;
   END CASE;
END
$func$  LANGUAGE plpgsql;

COMMENT ON FUNCTION f_xml_extract_val(text, xml, text) IS '
Extract element of an xpath from XML document
Overloaded function to f_xml_extract_val(..)
$3 .. mode is one of: one | all | dist'

Call:

SELECT f_xml_extract_val('//city', x, 'dist');

Main part

Name of target table: tbl; prim. key: id:

CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION f_sync_from_xml()
  RETURNS boolean AS
$func$
DECLARE
   datafile text := 'path/to/my_file.xml';  -- only relative path in db dir
   myxml    xml  := pg_read_file(datafile, 0, 100000000); -- arbitrary 100 MB
BEGIN
   -- demonstrating 4 variants of how to fetch values for educational purposes
   CREATE TEMP TABLE tmp ON COMMIT DROP AS
   SELECT (xpath('//some_id/text()', x))[1]::text AS id   -- id is unique  
        , f_xml_extract_val('//col1', x)          AS col1 -- one value
        , f_xml_extract_val('//col2/', x, 'all')  AS col2 -- all values incl. dupes
        , f_xml_extract_val('//col3/', x, 'dist') AS col3 -- distinct values
   FROM   unnest(xpath('/xml/path/to/datum', myxml)) x;

   -- 1.) DELETE?

   -- 2.) UPDATE
   UPDATE tbl t
   SET   (  col_1,   col2,   col3) =
         (i.col_1, i.col2, i.col3)
   FROM   tmp i
   WHERE  t.id = i.id
   AND   (t.col_1, t.col2, t.col3) IS DISTINCT FROM
         (i.col_1, i.col2, i.col3);

   -- 3.) INSERT NEW
   INSERT INTO tbl
   SELECT i.*
   FROM   tmp i
   WHERE  NOT EXISTS (SELECT 1 FROM tbl WHERE id = i.id);
END
$func$  LANGUAGE plpgsql;

Important notes

• This implementation checks on a primary key if the inserted row exists already and updates in this case. Only new rows are inserted.

• I use a temporary staging table to speed up the procedure.

• Tested with Postgres 8.4, 9.0 and 9.1.

• XML has to be well-formed.

• pg_read_file() has restrictions to it. The manual:

  Use of these functions is restricted to superusers.

  And:

  Only files within the database cluster directory and the log_directory can be accessed.

So you have to put your source file there – or create a symbolic link to your actual file/directory.

Or you can provide the file via Java in your case (I did it all inside Postgres).

Or you can import the data into 1 column of 1 row of a temporary table and take it from there.

Or you can use lo_import like demonstrated in this related answer on dba.SE.

• SQL to read XML from file into PostgreSQL database

This blog post by Scott Bailey helped me.