"plistlib" — Generate and parse Apple ".plist" files
****************************************************

**Source code:** Lib/plistlib.py

======================================================================

This module provides an interface for reading and writing the
“property list” files used by Apple, primarily on macOS and iOS. This
module supports both binary and XML plist files.

The property list (".plist") file format is a simple serialization
supporting basic object types, like dictionaries, lists, numbers and
strings.  Usually the top level object is a dictionary.

To write out and to parse a plist file, use the "dump()" and "load()"
functions.

To work with plist data in bytes objects, use "dumps()" and "loads()".

Values can be strings, integers, floats, booleans, tuples, lists,
dictionaries (but only with string keys), "bytes", "bytearray" or
"datetime.datetime" objects.

Changed in version 3.4: New API, old API deprecated.  Support for
binary format plists added.

Changed in version 3.8: Support added for reading and writing "UID"
tokens in binary plists as used by NSKeyedArchiver and
NSKeyedUnarchiver.

Changed in version 3.9: Old API removed.

See also:

  PList manual page
     Apple’s documentation of the file format.

This module defines the following functions:

plistlib.load(fp, *, fmt=None, dict_type=dict)

   Read a plist file. *fp* should be a readable and binary file
   object. Return the unpacked root object (which usually is a
   dictionary).

   The *fmt* is the format of the file and the following values are
   valid:

   * "None": Autodetect the file format

   * "FMT_XML": XML file format

   * "FMT_BINARY": Binary plist format

   The *dict_type* is the type used for dictionaries that are read
   from the plist file.

   XML data for the "FMT_XML" format is parsed using the Expat parser
   from "xml.parsers.expat" – see its documentation for possible
   exceptions on ill-formed XML.  Unknown elements will simply be
   ignored by the plist parser.

   The parser for the binary format raises "InvalidFileException" when
   the file cannot be parsed.

   New in version 3.4.

plistlib.loads(data, *, fmt=None, dict_type=dict)

   Load a plist from a bytes object. See "load()" for an explanation
   of the keyword arguments.

   New in version 3.4.

plistlib.dump(value, fp, *, fmt=FMT_XML, sort_keys=True, skipkeys=False)

   Write *value* to a plist file. *Fp* should be a writable, binary
   file object.

   The *fmt* argument specifies the format of the plist file and can
   be one of the following values:

   * "FMT_XML": XML formatted plist file

   * "FMT_BINARY": Binary formatted plist file

   When *sort_keys* is true (the default) the keys for dictionaries
   will be written to the plist in sorted order, otherwise they will
   be written in the iteration order of the dictionary.

   When *skipkeys* is false (the default) the function raises
   "TypeError" when a key of a dictionary is not a string, otherwise
   such keys are skipped.

   A "TypeError" will be raised if the object is of an unsupported
   type or a container that contains objects of unsupported types.

   An "OverflowError" will be raised for integer values that cannot be
   represented in (binary) plist files.

   New in version 3.4.

plistlib.dumps(value, *, fmt=FMT_XML, sort_keys=True, skipkeys=False)

   Return *value* as a plist-formatted bytes object. See the
   documentation for "dump()" for an explanation of the keyword
   arguments of this function.

   New in version 3.4.

The following classes are available:

class plistlib.UID(data)

   Wraps an "int".  This is used when reading or writing
   NSKeyedArchiver encoded data, which contains UID (see PList
   manual).

   It has one attribute, "data", which can be used to retrieve the int
   value of the UID.  "data" must be in the range "0 <= data < 2**64".

   New in version 3.8.

The following constants are available:

plistlib.FMT_XML

   The XML format for plist files.

   New in version 3.4.

plistlib.FMT_BINARY

   The binary format for plist files

   New in version 3.4.


Examples
========

Generating a plist:

   pl = dict(
       aString = "Doodah",
       aList = ["A", "B", 12, 32.1, [1, 2, 3]],
       aFloat = 0.1,
       anInt = 728,
       aDict = dict(
           anotherString = "<hello & hi there!>",
           aThirdString = "M\xe4ssig, Ma\xdf",
           aTrueValue = True,
           aFalseValue = False,
       ),
       someData = b"<binary gunk>",
       someMoreData = b"<lots of binary gunk>" * 10,
       aDate = datetime.datetime.fromtimestamp(time.mktime(time.gmtime())),
   )
   with open(fileName, 'wb') as fp:
       dump(pl, fp)

Parsing a plist:

   with open(fileName, 'rb') as fp:
       pl = load(fp)
   print(pl["aKey"])
