with open("natconfig.xml") as f: ruletemp = dict() ruleList = dict() rulebit = False; destinationbit = False ## Loop through config for line in f: line = line.replace("\t", "") if "" in line: rulebit = True if "" in line and len(ruletemp) >= 3: ruleList[ruletemp['internal-port']] = ruletemp ruletemp = dict() rulebit = False elif "" in line and len(ruletemp) < 3: ruletemp = dict() rulebit = False if rulebit: if "" in line: ruletemp["external-port"] = line.replace("", "").replace("\n", "") if '' in line: ruletemp['name'] = line.replace('', '').replace("\n", "") if '' in line: ruletemp['internal-port'] = line.replace('', "").replace("", "").replace("\n", "") print(len(ruleList))