books.xml is a file containing metadata about a short list of books. It's created by Microsoft and is used “in various samples throughout the Microsoft XML Core Services (MSXML) SDK”

You can find the original file here: External Link

NebolBooks is a small framework for reading and parsing this file into a collection of inter-linked objects. The metadata for each book is: id, author, title, genre, price, publish_date and description.

NebolBooks will create a list of books, a list of authors, and a list of genres and then link them together.

See the nuget page at https://nuget.nebol.se for version history etc.

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Add nuget packages

If you haven't done so already, add the nuget.nebol.se repository to Visual Studio by running this in Package Manager:

nuget sources add -name nuget.nebol.se -source https://nuget.nebol.se/api/odata

Then add the package:

Install-Package NebolBooks

The next step is to load the book metadata (which is embedded into NebolBooks) into a Library object by calling this static method:

var library = Library.ParseBooks();

There's another option, reading the books from a properly formatted xml file that you supply:

var library = Library.ParseBooks(@"D:\my_own_books.xml");

Now we have access to the data and we can use it as we please:

// iterate through the books and print out some info
int genre_id = 0;
foreach (var book in library.Books.OrderBy(item => item.GenreID))
{
	if (book.GenreID != genre_id)
	{
		genre_id = book.GenreID;
		string genre_name = library.Genres.First(item => item.ID == genre_id).Name;
		Console.WriteLine("\nGenre: " + genre_name);
	}
 
	string author_name = library.Authors.First(item => item.ID == book.AuthorID).Name;
 
	Console.WriteLine("Book ID " + book.ID + ": \"" + book.Title + "\" by " + author_name + " ($" + book.Price + ")");
}

The output should look like this:

Genre: Computer
Book ID bk101: "XML Developer's Guide" by Gambardella, Matthew ($44,95)
Book ID bk110: "Microsoft .NET: The Programming Bible" by O'Brien, Tim ($36,95)
Book ID bk111: "MSXML3: A Comprehensive Guide" by O'Brien, Tim ($36,95)
Book ID bk112: "Visual Studio 7: A Comprehensive Guide" by Galos, Mike ($49,95)

Genre: Fantasy
Book ID bk102: "Midnight Rain" by Ralls, Kim ($5,95)
Book ID bk103: "Maeve Ascendant" by Corets, Eva ($5,95)
Book ID bk104: "Oberon's Legacy" by Corets, Eva ($5,95)
Book ID bk105: "The Sundered Grail" by Corets, Eva ($5,95)

Genre: Romance
Book ID bk106: "Lover Birds" by Randall, Cynthia ($4,95)
Book ID bk107: "Splish Splash" by Thurman, Paula ($4,95)

Genre: Horror
Book ID bk108: "Creepy Crawlies" by Knorr, Stefan ($4,95)

Genre: Science Fiction
Book ID bk109: "Paradox Lost" by Kress, Peter ($6,95)