Is it possible to create an xsd that supports a parent node and child node having the same name?

Question

So before anyone tells me I shouldn't do this, I completely agree. However I have an xml DataFeed coming in from a third party. I already am reaching out to them to see if they can change it, but I figured I had better attack it from both sides.

The offending tags in the XML are as follows:

    <Tags>
      <TagDimension id="Topic">
        <ExternalId>Topic</ExternalId>
        <Tags>
          <Tag>
            <Label>awesome</Label>
          </Tag>
        </Tags>
      </TagDimension>
    </Tags>

I am by no means an XML/XSD whiz. My skills consist of running xsd.exe from the VS command line which brought me:

C:\temp>xsd sample.xml Microsoft (R) Xml Schemas/DataTypes support utility [Microsoft (R) .NET Framework, Version 2.0.50727.3038] Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Error: There was an error processing 'sample.xml'. - The table (Tags) cannot be the child table to itself in nested relations.

What's the best way to handle this?

Answer 1

Well I found "a way" although I am not sure it is a good way. It looks like an XSD file does not have any problems with recursively named nodes. It's just the xsd.exe tool. What I did was rename the inner <Tag> node to <Tag2>, which allowed me to generate the xsd file. I then opened the xsd in Visual Studio and renamed it back to <Tag>.

It looks like this is more a result of my dependence on tools and lack of knowledge around XSD/XML, but I would love it if someone more knowledgeable would chime in on this.