xmlsedgpx

How to remove XML Tag Blocks from the command line with one or more occurrences

I have an xml file that looks something like this:

<xml>
  <trkseg>
  <note>
    <to>A</to>
    <from>B</from>
    <body>
      keep this
    </body>
  </trkseg>
  <trkseg>
  </note>
  ...
  </trkseg>
</xml>

And I wanted to remove all the following code. This combination of tags can occur more than once in the file:

</trkseg>
<trkseg>

Any tips on how to fix this?

What I expected was this:

<xml>
  <trkseg>
  <note>
    <to>A</to>
    <from>B</from>
    <body>
      keep this
    </body>
  </note>
  ...
  </trkseg>
</xml>

I tried using this sed command but doesn't work the way I want:

sed -i '' -e '/<\/trkseg>/,/<trkseg>/d' my-file.xml

I get this result:

<xml>
  <trkseg>
  <note>
    <to>A</to>
    <from>B</from>
    <body>
      keep this
    </body>
  </note>
  ...
Solution

  • It can be done with GNU sed

    sample file

    <xml>
  <trkseg>
    one
    two
  </trkseg>
  <trkseg>
    three
    four
  </trkseg>
</xml>

    sed script

    sed -znr '{
  :-A s/<[\/]trkseg>/&/2;t-B;b-C
  :-B s/[[:space:]]*<[\/]trkseg>//1;t-A
  :-C s/[[:space:]]*<trkseg>//2g;p
}' file

    output:

    <xml>
  <trkseg>
    one
    two
    three
    four
  </trkseg>
</xml>