Replace text in xml files with Powershell

Yesterday I was working at client site. It is a Windows server isolated from external network. It is not allowed to install any third party software in the machine. However, I got a task in hand to replace all xml files name from “My Report” to “My Report (New)”. The original file temp.xml looks like this:

<ReportList>
  <Report Name="My Report">
  </Report>
</ReportList>

while the excepted output temp-new.xml file I want for import looks in a structure like this:

<ReportList>
  <Report Name="My Report (New)">
  </Report>
</ReportList>

I have no tools in hand and it would takes many hours to replace hundreds of files one by one manually. The only thing accessible for scripting is the PowerShell. Here are a few lines of code to get things done.

Step 1: Load all xml files inside my Test folder.

$files = Get-Childitem C:UsersvictorleungtwDesktopTest -Recurse -Include *.xml

Step 2: Modify all report name and add “ (New)” after the original name

$xmldata = [xml](Get-Content $file); 
 $name = $xmldata.ReportList.Report.GetAttribute("Name");
 $name = $name + " (New)"; $xmldata.ReportList.Report.SetAttribute("Name", $name);
 $xmldata.Save($file)
}

Step 3: Change the file name from temp.xml to temp-new.xml

Get-ChildItem *.xml | Rename-Item -NewName { $_.name -Replace '.xml$','-new.xml' }

Done! All the files are changed. Happy coding 🙂