Question

Hope you all are doing well.

I need to import an XML-feed from a website to my SQL Server database. I don’t know much about XML.

The feed structure is an bit complex. Here is the sample of that file:

<line_feed>
<FeedTime>1279519582927</FeedTime>
<lastContest>4103839</lastContest>
<lastGame>58629754</lastGame>
<events>
<event>
    <event_datetimeGMT>2010-07-19 21:30</event_datetimeGMT>
    <gamenumber>174087393</gamenumber>
    <sporttype>Tennis</sporttype>
    <league>abc</league>
    <participants>
        <participant>
            <participant_name>R. Ram</participant_name>
            <contestantnum>4303</contestantnum>
            <rotnum>4303</rotnum>
            <visiting_home_draw>Visiting</visiting_home_draw>
        </participant>
        <participant>
            <participant_name>K. Beck</participant_name>
            <contestantnum>4304</contestantnum>
            <rotnum>4304</rotnum>
            <visiting_home_draw>Home</visiting_home_draw>
        </participant>
    </participants>
    <periods>
        <period>
            <period_number>0</period_number>
            <period_description>Game</period_description>
            <periodcutoff_datetimeGMT>2010-07-19 21:30</periodcutoff_datetimeGMT>
            <period_status>I</period_status>
            <period_update>open</period_update>
            <spread_maximum>250</spread_maximum>
            <moneyline_maximum>1500</moneyline_maximum>
            <total_maximum>250</total_maximum>
            <moneyline>
                <moneyline_visiting>135</moneyline_visiting>
                <moneyline_home>-146</moneyline_home>
            </moneyline>
        </period>
        <period>
            <period_number>0</period_number>
            <period_description>Game</period_description>
            <periodcutoff_datetimeGMT>2010-07-19 21:30</periodcutoff_datetimeGMT>
            <period_status>I</period_status>
            <period_update>open</period_update>
            <spread_maximum>250</spread_maximum>
            <moneyline_maximum>250</moneyline_maximum>
            <total_maximum>250</total_maximum>
            <spread>
                <spread_visiting>2</spread_visiting>
                <spread_adjust_visiting>101</spread_adjust_visiting>
                <spread_home>-2</spread_home>
                <spread_adjust_home>-118</spread_adjust_home>
            </spread>
            <total>
                <total_points>22.5</total_points>
                <over_adjust>-108</over_adjust>
                <under_adjust>-108</under_adjust>
            </total>
        </period>
        <period>
            <period_number>1</period_number>
            <period_description>1st Set</period_description>
            <periodcutoff_datetimeGMT>2010-07-19 21:30</periodcutoff_datetimeGMT>
            <period_status>I</period_status>
            <period_update>open</period_update>
            <spread_maximum>5000</spread_maximum>
            <moneyline_maximum>250</moneyline_maximum>
            <total_maximum>5000</total_maximum>
            <moneyline>
                <moneyline_visiting>114</moneyline_visiting>
                <moneyline_home>-133</moneyline_home>
            </moneyline>
        </period>
    </periods>
</event>
</events>
</line_feed>

Can you please help me out, how can I approach to load the data from that feed to SQL Server.

Please also ask me if any other details needed to understand this scenario. Awaiting your kind response.

Thank You,
Prashant

Answer 1

If your XML is wel-formed, you can store it in an xml type variable. Then you can use XPath to read fields from it:

declare @xml xml
set @xml = '
<line_feed>
<PinnacleFeedTime>1279519582927</PinnacleFeedTime>
...
'

select @xml.value('(line_feed/events/event/sporttype)[1]', 'VARCHAR(8000)')

This would print Tennis.