XML File Format

You can access the sample XML from Obout Downloaded Suite's folder 
\\ASPTreeView\xmldemo.xml

Open XML file in Notepad instead of opening in browser to see the actual XML. 
You can see the XML file in the browse, but note that browsers show XML file in 
modified form for better presentation.You can see the actual XML only in Notepad 
(not in the browsers).

Specify your complete tree structure between the <root></root> tag. 
After that, create the tag structure the same as your tree structure. The tag 
name will be used as the node ID in the tree structure. Define all child nodes 
between their parent tag nodes. 

Please go through with the example to understand more.


<XML type='text/xml'>
    <root>
        <N1 html='XML Methods' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url=''>
            <N11 html=From File' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url='' />
            <N12 html='From String' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url='' />
        </N1>
        <N2 html='XML Methods' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url=''>
            <N21…/>
            <N22…/>
        </N2>
    …
    </root>
</XML>



N1 and N2 nodes are under the root node. N11 and N12 nodes are the child nodes
of N1. So they are declared between the <N1> </N1> tag. To add child 
nodes to the N11 node, declare the XML markup of the children between the 
<N11></N11> tags.

Each XML node should have these attributes:
 - html (the text/html of the node)
 - img (the icon of the node),
 - exp (boolean - set it to 'true' to make the node appear expanded)
 - url (url to the page from where the children of the current node will be loaded dynamically) 





Difference between XML_LoadFromFile and XML_LoadFromString

XML_LoadFromFile method reads the data from XML file whereas XML_LoadFromString 
creates the tree from a string containing the XML markup. You need to generate the string
at runtime, from your C#/VB code. The advantage of the XML_LoadFromFile method 
is that it keeps XML markup separated from your code.





Special characters in the HTML attribute of the nodes

The XML standard has a set of special characters that cannot be used inside the values of  
the attributes of an XML tag. These characters are : < > & " '
If you need to use these characters you need to replace them with the so-called "escape" 
characters.The escape characters are:

&lt; 
The less-than character (<) starts element markup (the first character of a 
start-tag or an end-tag).

&amp;
The ampersand character (&) starts entity markup (the first character of a 
character entity reference).

&gt;
The greater-than character (>) ends a start-tag or an end-tag.

&quot;
The double-quote character (") can be symbolised with this character entity
reference when you need to embed a double-quote inside a string which is already 
double-quoted.

&#39; 
The apostrophe or single-quote character (') can be symbolised with this character
entity reference when you need to embed a single-quote or apostrophe inside a string 
which is already single-quoted.





Create the String for the XML_LoadFromString method

While generating the XML string you need to pay attention to the special characters explained above.
For example to generate a string containing the following XML markup:


<XML type='text/xml'>
    <root>
        <N1 html='XML Methods' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url=''>
            <N11 html='From File' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url='' />
            <N12 html='From String' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url='' />
        </N1>
    </root>
</XML> 

Use the following C# code:

string varXMLStr = "<XML type='text/xml'>";
varXMLStr += "<root>" ;
varXMLStr += "<N1 html='XML Methods' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url=''>";
varXMLStr += "<N11 html='From File' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url='' />";
varXMLStr += "<N12 html='From String' img='Folder.gif' exp='True' url='' />";
varXMLStr += "</N1>";
varXMLStr += "</root>";
varXMLStr += "</XML>";
 





XML_LoadFromFile method

Get the absolute path where your XML file resides, using the
"Request.MapPath()" method and pass the path to the  XML_LoadFromFile
method. 

For example, if your XML file is in same folder as the aspx file, you can 
use this C# code: 

//C# Code 

void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e) 
{ 
obout_ASPTreeView_2_NET.Tree oTree = new obout_ASPTreeView_2_NET.Tree(); 
oTree.id = "tree_"; 
oTree.AddRootNode("root", true, "oInboxF.gif"); 
//XML file is in same folder where aspx file reside 
oTree.XML_LoadFromFile(Request.MapPath("xmldemo.xml")); 
oTree.FolderIcons = "tree2/icons"; 
oTree.FolderScript = "tree2/script"; 
oTree.FolderStyle = "tree2/style/Classic"; 
TreeView.Text = oTree.HTML(); 
}  





Get the structure of the tree in XML format

You can use the XML_WriteToString method to get the structure of the tree as 
XML markup. The string returned by this method can be stored in a database.

varStr = oTree.XML_WriteToString 





Tree Performance

Microsoft said that XML performance degrades when XML file size is over 150 KB. 
We recommend to use database instead of XML for large trees. When file size is 
less than 150 KB, the tree is lightning fast.

How to populate from database