How to generate XML documents with namespaces in Python

createElementNS() is defined as:

def createElementNS(self, namespaceURI, qualifiedName):    prefix, localName = _nssplit(qualifiedName)    e = Element(qualifiedName, namespaceURI, prefix)    e.ownerDocument = self    return e

so…

import xml.dom.minidomdoc = xml.dom.minidom.Document()el = doc.createElementNS('http://example.net/ns', 'ex:el')#--------------------------------------------------^^^^^doc.appendChild(el)print(doc.toprettyxml())

yields:

<?xml version="1.0" ?><ex:el/>

…not quite there…

import xml.dom.minidomdoc = xml.dom.minidom.Document()el = doc.createElementNS('http://example.net/ns', 'ex:el')el.setAttribute("xmlns:ex", "http://example.net/ns")doc.appendChild(el)print(doc.toprettyxml())

yields:

<?xml version="1.0" ?><ex:el xmlns:ex="http://example.net/ns"/>

alternatively:

import xml.dom.minidomdoc = xml.dom.minidom.Document()el = doc.createElementNS('http://example.net/ns', 'el')el.setAttribute("xmlns", "http://example.net/ns")doc.appendChild(el)print(doc.toprettyxml())

wich produces:

<?xml version="1.0" ?><el xmlns="http://example.net/ns"/>

It looks like you'd have to do it manually. Element.writexml() shows no indication that namespaces would get any special treatment.

EDIT: This answer is targeted at xml.dom.minidom only, since the OP used it in the question. I do not indicate that it was impossible to use XML namespaces in Python generally. ;-)

This feature is already proposed; a patch is slumbering in the Python bug database. See Tomalak's answer (in short: Manually add the xmlns attribute) for a workaround.