# Problem with XML appending and AS3

**URL:** <https://forum.kirupa.com/t/problem-with-xml-appending-and-as3/315787>\
**Category:** flash\
**Created:** [November 4, 2010, 2:50am UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/problem-with-xml-appending-and-as3/315787 "2010-11-04T02:50:24Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![zkdy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/5f8ce5/32.png) [@zkdy](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/zkdy)\
**Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 2:50am UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/problem-with-xml-appending-and-as3/315787/1 "2010-11-04T02:50:24Z")

</div>

Hi all,

Basically I have an XML file which will be used to populate a menuBar inside a flex application. Currently the format of the XML file is like so.

\<mymenu\>  
\<menuitem label=“File”\>  
\<menuitem label=“New” /\>  
\<menuitem label=“Open” /\>   
\<menuitem label=“Close” /\>   
\</menuitem\>

```
&lt;menuitem label="Edit"&gt;
		&lt;menuitem label="" /&gt;
&lt;/menuitem&gt;   
			
&lt;menuitem label="View"&gt;
	&lt;menuitem label="Zoom"/&gt;  
	&lt;menuitem label="Toolbars"/&gt; 
&lt;/menuitem&gt; 

```

\</mymenu\>

Currently, my format for reading the XML file is like so.  
var xmlData = new XML(e.target.data); //e. is the event listener when the urlloader is completed.

var menuBarItems:XMLList = xmlData.menuitem;

for each (var menuItem:XML in menuBarItems) {  
//Each loop will get a single menu including submenus  
ex. \<menuitem label=“File”\>  
\<menuitem label=“New” /\>  
\<menuitem label=“Open” /\>  
\<menuitem label=“Close” /\>  
\</menuitem\>  
//Next loop will be the Edit  
}

Problem is… I need to be able to edit the data for Edit. Because Edit should be just  
\<menuitem label=“Edit”\>  
\</menuitem\>

Because there are cases where the edit should be no submenus underneath it, Unfortunately when i change the xml file to this, the edit will not be read all together (inside the for loop since it does not contain any menuitem. i need to be able to edit it since its possible that i might need to add new childen as shown below). There are cases wherein i need to add new nodes inside the edit  
for submenus  
ex.  
\<menuitem label=“Edit”\>  
\<menuitem label=“Edit 1”/\>  
\<menuitem label=“Edit 2”/\>  
\</menuitem\>

How should I approach this? How should my XML file look like? I’m not really sure what to do since the appendchild would only work for lists contianing one item. but if i do have i blank item it would look like

\<menuitem label=“Edit”\>  
\<menuitem label=""/\>  
\<menuitem label=“Edit 1”/\>  
\</menuitem\>

leaving a submenu blank and of no use.

Any help would be appreciated.