Editing XML as a dictionary in python?

<root>
  <level1>leaf1</level1>
  <level2>leaf2</level2>
</root>

from BeautifulSoup import BeatifulStoneSoup, Tag, NavigableString

soup = BeautifulStoneSoup('config-template.xml') # get the parser for the xml file
soup.contents[0].name
# u'root'

soup.root.contents[0].name
# u'level1'

import re
tags_starting_with_level = soup.findAll(re.compile('^level'))
for tag in tags_starting_with_level: print tag.name
# level1
# level2

# build and insert a new level with a new leaf
level3 = Tag(soup, 'level3')
level3.insert(0, NavigableString('leaf3')
soup.root.insert(2, level3)

print soup.prettify()
# <root>
#  <level1>
#   leaf1
#  </level1>
#  <level2>
#   leaf2
#  </level2>
#  <level3>
#   leaf3
#  </level3>
# </root>

import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET
doc = ET.parse("template.xml")
lvl1 = doc.findall("level1-name")[0]
lvl1.remove(lvl1.find("leaf1")
lvl1.remove(lvl1.find("leaf2")
# or use del lvl1[idx]
doc.write("config-new.xml")

import xml.etree.ElementTree as etree

tree = etree.parse('test.xml')
root = tree.getroot()

def xml_to_dict(el):
  d={}
  if el.text:
    d[el.tag] = el.text
  else:
    d[el.tag] = {}
  children = el.getchildren()
  if children:
    d[el.tag] = map(xml_to_dict, children)
  return d

{'note': [{'to': 'Tove'},
          {'from': 'Jani'},
          {'heading': 'Reminder'},
          {'body': "Don't forget me this weekend!"}]}

def xml_to_dictionary(element):
    l = len(namespace)
    dictionary={}
    tag = element.tag[l:]
    if element.text:
        if (element.text == ' '):
            dictionary[tag] = {}
        else:
            dictionary[tag] = element.text
    children = element.getchildren()
    if children:
        subdictionary = {}
        for child in children:
            for k,v in xml_to_dictionary(child).items():
                if k in subdictionary:
                    if ( isinstance(subdictionary[k], list)):
                        subdictionary[k].append(v)
                    else:
                        subdictionary[k] = [subdictionary[k], v]
                else:
                    subdictionary[k] = v
        if (dictionary[tag] == {}):
            dictionary[tag] = subdictionary
        else:
            dictionary[tag] = [dictionary[tag], subdictionary]
    if element.attrib:
        attribs = {}
        for k,v in element.attrib.items():
            attribs[k] = v
        if (dictionary[tag] == {}):
            dictionary[tag] = attribs
        else:
            dictionary[tag] = [dictionary[tag], attribs]
    return dictionary

spacepattern = re.compile(r's+')
mydictionary = xml_to_dictionary(ElementTree.XML(spacepattern.sub(' ', content)))

{'note': {'to': 'Tove',
         'from': 'Jani',
         'heading': 'Reminder',
         'body': "Don't forget me this weekend!"}}

<elementName attributeName='attributeContent'>elementContent</elementName>

print xml.etree.ElementTree.tostring( conf_new )

root        = ET.parse(xh)
data        = root.getroot()
xdic        = {}
if data > None:
    for part in data.getchildren():
        xdic[part.tag] = part.text