Question

Is there a generic/automatic way in R or in python to parse xml files with its nodes and attributes, automatically generate mysql tables for storing that information and then populate those tables.

Answer 1

Regarding

Is there a generic/automatic way in R
to parse xml files with its nodes and
attributes, automatically generate
mysql tables for storing that
information and then populate those
tables.

the answer is a good old yes you can, at least in R.

The XML package for R can read XML documents and return R data.frame types in a single call using the xmlToDataFrame() function.

And the RMySQL package can transfer data.frame objects to the database in a single command—including table creation if need be—using the dbWriteTable() function defined in the common DBI backend for R and provided for MySQL by RMySQL.

So in short: two lines can do it, so you can easily write yourself a new helper function that does it along with a commensurate amount of error checking.