Script to download xml files from a website

I would like to write a script that download xml files from

https://www.treasurydirect.gov/xml/

with the file name that starts from R_ and put into a single excel file. Please advise.

[Rena Berman]

(Answers Dev) Restored edit

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

MATLAB Answers is not a private consulting service. The "cost" we charge for providing answers is that the posted Questions and Answers are public so that everyone can learn from them. Editing away your question after you have received your answer is rude.

If you want to ask questions without the question and answer becoming public, then you should hire a private consultant.

[Adam]

It's a shame we can't have a system for flagging users who keep doing this so we know not to waste time answering their questions in future. I know we can search every person's history of questions before answering, but obviously that isn't something anyone wants to do.

Answer 2

[Walter Roberson]

base = 'https://www.treasurydirect.gov/xml/'
S = urlread(base);
R_files = regexp(S,'(?<=<a href=")R[^"]+', 'match');
num_files = length(R_files);
R_content = cell(num_files, 1);
for K = 1 : num_files
  try
    R_content{K} = urlread( [base, R_files{K}] );
  end
end

fid = fopen('YourOutput.csv', 'wt');

for K = 1 : num_files
  fwrite(fid, regexprep(R_content{K}, {'^', '$'}, {'"', '"'}, 'lineanchors') );
end

fclose(fid)

My Magic 8 Ball predicts disappointment in the CSV file created: it predicts that you want to extract particular data from each of the files and write those as columns, instead of what you asked for, which is to write the content of .xml files directly as lines in the csv.