Nmap Development: Re: Nmap XML HowTo

[MadHat Unspecific <madhat () unspecific com>]

aihomes () comcast net wrote:
> MS Excel 2003 does a pretty good job of parsing XML. I use it for nessus XML output, but haven't taken a stab at it 
> for nmap. It's not open source, of course, and not command line but it's pretty handy...
>
> I also stick to greppable because I use sed, awk and the like for writing small scripts...I hope this output will 
> remain an option in future releases...
I second that request.
I see the use of XML, but for what I need, and the fact that what I have 
works, grepable works out quite well for me.

> Egan 
> Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless handheld  
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: "Amit Kumar Saha" <amitsaha.in () gmail com>
> Date: Thu, 10 May 2007 17:42:37 
> To:nmap-dev () insecure org
> Subject: Re: Nmap XML HowTo
>
> Hi Fyodor,
>
> > Hi Amit.  I think the HOWTO is a great idea!  And version 0.1 is a
> > good start.
> Thanks.
>
> > Maybe instead of designing a command-line utility specifically for
> > Nmap XML, you can demonstrate in your HOWTO how to use existing
> > generic XML command-line utilities to parse Nmap output.  I think many
> > Nmap users (including me to some extent) fall back on Nmap grepable
> > output because we grew up with command-line tools like awk, sed, cut,
> > etc. for parsing plaintext.  But parsing Nmap XML output using
> > command-line XML tools to grab fields with XPath and the like can lead
> > to command-lines which are shorter, easier to write, and a hundred
> > times easier to read than a big string of piped sed/awk/etc.
> I am currently playing with XMLStarlet, proposed by Dirk. I should be
> able to put up something soon.
>
> > But I do see the value in other sorts of special-purpose Nmap XML
> > command-line utilities (and/or libraries).  They could do things like
> > take 2 Nmap XML output files and produce an XML file describing the
> > differences.  Tools like UMIT or PBNJ or simpler cron jobs could all
> > share such a common utility/library.
> This will be the next thing on my mind and lets us see what Adriano
> says about its application to Umit.
>
> Cheers,


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