# Install xidel with Homebrew, chocolatey, Nix, scoop XPath/XQuery 3.0, JSONiq interpreter to extract data from HTML/XML/JSON. Version 0.9.8 via Homebrew; verified 2026-06-22. ## Install ```sh sudo av install brew:xidel ``` Additional install commands: ### macOS - Homebrew (100%): ```sh brew install xidel ``` Evidence: local Homebrew formula metadata ### Linux - Nix (92%): ```sh nix profile install nixpkgs#xidel ``` Evidence: nixpkgs package indexes: pkgs/by-name/xi/xidel/package.nix from https://api.github.com/repos/NixOS/nixpkgs/git/trees/master?recursive=1 ### Windows - Chocolatey (92%): ```sh choco install xidel ``` Evidence: Chocolatey community package catalog: xidel from http://community.chocolatey.org/api/v2/Packages?$filter=IsLatestVersion&$select=Id&$top=1000&$skiptoken='7.9764','inconsolata' - Scoop (92%): ```sh scoop install main/xidel ``` Evidence: Scoop official bucket manifest trees: bucket/xidel.json from https://api.github.com/repos/ScoopInstaller/Main/git/trees/master?recursive=1 ## Package facts - **Package key:** brew:xidel - **Package manager:** Homebrew - **Package manager page:** - **Version:** 0.9.8 - **Source summary:** XPath/XQuery 3.0, JSONiq interpreter to extract data from HTML/XML/JSON - **Homepage:** - **Repository:** - **Upstream docs:** - **License:** GPL-3.0-or-later - **Source archive:** - **Last updated:** 2026-06-22T14:06:41-07:00 - **Generated:** 2026-07-08T18:08:21+00:00 ## Executables - xidel (cli) - xidel (alias) ## Dependencies - openssl@4 ## Build dependencies - fpc ## Install behavior - Post-install hook: not defined - Bottle: available on arm64_linux, arm64_sequoia, arm64_sonoma, arm64_tahoe, sonoma, x86_64_linux ## Freshness - Page generated: 2026-07-08 - Package-manager version: 0.9.8 - Package-manager updated: 2026-06-22 - Local data: ok - Upstream repository: https://github.com/benibela/xidel - info: No cached GitHub release or tag data was available. ## Project history and usage Xidel is a command-line extraction and transformation tool for HTML, XML, and JSON. Its niche is combining downloader, scraper, XPath/XQuery interpreter, CSS selector tool, JSONiq/XPath JSON query support, and pattern-matching templates in one small CLI. ### Project history The official homepage dates the initial Xidel release to 2012-09-05 and describes it as the first stand-alone command-line release of the VideLibri backend. Author Benito van der Zander maintains the tool, and the homepage states that the source history lives in a SourceForge Mercurial repository with GitHub and GitLab mirrors. Xidel's evolution is language-support driven. Version 0.6 added XQuery support in 2012, 0.7 added JSONiq in 2013, 0.8 improved JSONiq and added arbitrary precision arithmetic in 2014, 0.9 expanded XPath/XQuery 3 syntax in 2015, 0.9.4 completed much of XPath/XQuery 3.0 support in 2016, and the 0.9.9 development branch advertises broad XPath/XQuery 3.1 and partial XPath 4.0 syntax support. ### Adoption history Xidel is not a mass-market CLI like curl, but it has a loyal scraper/data-extraction niche because it can handle awkward mixed web data without gluing together several programs. The GitHub mirror metadata shows hundreds of stars, while the homepage documents prebuilt binaries for Windows, Linux, Android, and Mac preview builds, plus a single-binary usage model. Its adoption path often overlaps with users of `curl`, `wget`, `xmlstarlet`, `jq`, XPath tools, and web scrapers. The difference is that Xidel can fetch, follow, query, pattern-match, transform, serialize, and export shell variables inside one XQuery-capable executable. ### How it is used Typical usage is `xidel URL --extract QUERY`, where the query may be CSS, XPath, XQuery, JSONiq, or an annotated pattern template. The homepage examples include extracting Google result URLs, following links and printing titles, querying JSON APIs, submitting forms, transforming HTML, serializing JSON/XML/HTML, and exporting extracted values as shell variables. Package users reach for Xidel when a one-liner needs more structure than grep/sed but less ceremony than a custom scraper. It is especially useful for HTML pages with broken markup, API responses that need XPath-like traversal, and data extraction tasks that mix downloading, following links, and transforming output. ### Why package nerds care Xidel is package-nerd significant because it is an unusually dense single-purpose CLI: web fetcher, query language runtime, and data serializer in one package. That makes it a useful example of a tool whose value comes from bundling several web-data primitives behind one stable command. It also has a distinctive maintenance profile: FreePascal source, Mercurial origin, Git mirrors, SourceForge downloads, and modern package-manager distribution. That mix makes it feel like old-school Unix web tooling that kept absorbing newer query-language standards. ### Timeline - 2012-09-05: initial Xidel release as a stand-alone command-line tool from the VideLibri backend. - 2012-11-06: version 0.6 adds XQuery support. - 2013-03-26: version 0.7 adds JSONiq support. - 2015-06-28: version 0.9 adds more XPath/XQuery 3.0 syntax, higher-order functions, and multipart form support. - 2016-06-08: version 0.9.4 completes much of XPath/XQuery 3.0 support and improves XQuery Test Suite conformance. - 2018-04-02: version 0.9.8 improves cookies, module loading, pattern matching, and multipage-template functions. - 0.9.9 development: the project advertises XPath/XQuery 3.1 progress and partial XPath 4.0 syntax support. ### Related projects - VideLibri is the parent application/backend lineage from which Xidel was split as a stand-alone command-line tool. - XPath, XQuery, JSONiq, CSS selectors, and the W3C serialization/data-model standards are the query-language ecosystem Xidel packages for command-line use. - curl, wget, jq, and xmlstarlet are adjacent command-line tools that overlap with Xidel's web fetching, JSON querying, and XML processing use cases. ### Sources - - - - - ## Security Notes generalized runtime or code generation signal. - **Geiger risk:** yellow / medium - generalized runtime or code generation signal ## Source Database Details - **Source Database:** Homebrew formula API - **Tap:** homebrew/core - **Full Name:** xidel - **Version Scheme:** 0 - **Revision:** 2 - **Head Version:** HEAD - **Bottle Stable Root URL:** - **Deprecated:** no - **Disabled:** no - **Keg Only:** no - **URL Keys:** head, stable ## Other Package-Manager Records - Nix - xidel: normalized package name match | nixpkgs package indexes: pkgs/by-name/xi/xidel/package.nix from https://api.github.com/repos/NixOS/nixpkgs/git/trees/master?recursive=1 - Chocolatey - xidel: normalized package name match | Chocolatey community package catalog: xidel from http://community.chocolatey.org/api/v2/Packages?$filter=IsLatestVersion&$select=Id&$top=1000&$skiptoken='7.9764','inconsolata' - Scoop - main/xidel: normalized package name match | Scoop official bucket manifest trees: bucket/xidel.json from https://api.github.com/repos/ScoopInstaller/Main/git/trees/master?recursive=1 ## Related links - [Secret-risk packages](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/secret-risk-packages/) - Has protected-tool coverage, approval-gate, or non-low Geiger security signals. - [Terminal utility packages](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/terminal-utilities/) - Matched terminal and command-line workflow metadata. - [Text processing packages](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/text-processing-tools/) - Matched text, document, or structured-data processing metadata. - [Language runtime packages](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/language-runtime-packages/) - Matched language runtime, compiler, or interpreter metadata. - [openssl@4](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/openssl-4/) - Runtime dependency declared by Homebrew. - [fpc](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/fpc/) - Build dependency declared by Homebrew. - [scrapy](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/scrapy/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data, web-scraping. - [basex](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/basex/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data, xpath, xquery. - [flux](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/flux/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data, query-language. - [prqlc](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/prqlc/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data, query-language. - [dbxml](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/dbxml/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data, xquery. - [trafilatura](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/trafilatura/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data, web-scraping. - [adios2](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/adios2/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data. - [alluxio](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/brew/alluxio/) - Shares av.db curated category or tags: cli, data. - [firecrawl-cli](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/npm/firecrawl-cli/) - Both packages work with overlapping file formats or content types. Shared terms: cli, data, extract, json, scraping. - [firecrawl-mcp](https://www.automicvault.com/pkg/npm/firecrawl-mcp/) - Local package facts share a topical domain. Shared terms: cli, data, scraping, web, web-scraping. ## Combined YAML source View the package source record on GitHub. [combined/xidel.yml](https://github.com/automic-vault/db/blob/main/combined/xidel.yml) ## Sources - Nucleus package database - Geiger risk classifier - package-page enrichment - curated package history - package version freshness - av.db category and tag curation - package relationship graph - external package-manager database matches - cross-ecosystem install command graph