XQuery CLI

This lib lets you run XPath/XQuery or XQUF on XML files. Uses child processes to support traversing large amounts of content.

Install

npm i xquery-cli -g

You can now use the xq command.

Alternative to installing xq, you can run npx xquery-cli

XPath and XQuery 3.1 Expressions

XPath or XQuery expressions can be piped from another process, loaded from an .xqm file, or in the --expression (-x) option.

The following input is all equal:

xq --expression "fn:current-date()"
xq -x "fn:current-date()"
xq --module ./examples/simple-example.xqm

Or you pipe it in:

echo "fn:current-date()" | xq
cat ./examples/simple-example.xqm | xq
curl -s https://pastebin.com/raw/53pFDEbk | xq

XML files

Any argument that is an option counts as an XML file location for which the expression is evaluated.

xq ./foo.xml -x "()"
xq ./foo.xml ./bar.xml -x "()"
xq ./foo.xml -x "()" ./bar.xml
xq ./*.xml -x "()"

For terminals that don't expand file patterns, or to circumvent a "Too many arguments in command line" error, use --glob (-g):

xq --glob "./examples/**/*.xml" -x "()"
xq -g "./examples/**/*.xml" -x "()"

If you want to use both pattern expansion and the --glob flag you are a mad lad. It would be useful to know that you may get duplicate results, and results may be ordered differently.

Updating XML

fontoxpath supports XQuery Update Facility, therefore xq does too. Simply make your expression updating to use it, and xq will update the affected files in place -- It's recommended that you do this in version controlled content only. Optionally combine with the --dry option to not actually make file changes just yet.

xq ./foo.xml -x "replace node /* with <bar />"

Variables

When running a query on files you are provisioned with the $document-uri variable. It is set to the name of the file that that query is evaluated on at the time.

xq ./foo.xml -x "\$document-uri"

On Windows you might not have to escape the $.

Reporting

By default XQuery returns are logged to STDOUT, and event data is logged to STDERR. Use --no-stdout (-o) or --no-stderr (-O) if you want.

xq -x "fontoxpath:version()" --no-stderr

You can also control the amount of messages, by picking to limit yourself to rawOutput``verbose, info, or error and everything "above" it like so:

xq -x "fontoxpath:version()" --log-level verbose

Acknowledgements

This tool relies on the excellent fontoxpath, slimdom and saxes.