Problems writing to a file

[Graham Wickens]

Firstly Seasonal Greetings to all!

Trying to automate a weekly data extraction task.
I want to concatenate data from Five daily emails I receive into a single file with some data formatting (code for this is removed as I know it works). I appear to have two errors that I cannot solve.

1)

text = *for_each(tag,stritran_multi(tag,"[COLOR="#0000FF"]<space><space>[/COLOR]","[COLOR="#0000FF"]<space>[/COLOR]"),text)

I assumed that this would be applied to ALL occurrances in the list entry, but only does the first one, thereby having to put this code in a small loop to get ALL occurences done. "<SPACE>" used to clarify the spaces in the *stritran_multi* command.

2) each WRITE_LINE is writing 1 CRLF() to the beginning and end of each record so I have a blank line after each line of data.

anyone got a work around for this?

dim defdir as c = "c:\my databases\aviation\g-info\\"
dim write_to_file as c = "g_info_updates.txt"
dim header_text as c = "ModeS	Reg	MSN	Type	Action	Date	Notes"
dim filelist as c
filelist = filefind.get(defdir-"g-info changes*.txt",0,"PN")
fpw = file.open(defdir-write_to_file,FILE_RW_SHARED)
fpw.write_line(header_text)
FOR each tag in filelist
	fp = file.open(tag,file_ro_shared)
	WHILE .not. fp.eof()
		text = fp.read_line()
		IF ut(text) <> "" THEN
			[COLOR="#FF0000"]FOR x = 1 TO 4
				text = *for_each(tag,stritran_multi(tag,"  "," "),text)
			NEXT x[/COLOR]
			IF regex_match(left(text,6),"[[:xdigit:]]{6}","egi") THEN 
                        ' data formatting code removed
[COLOR="#FF0000"]				fpw.write_line(text)
[/COLOR]			END IF
		END IF
	END WHILE
	fp.close()
next
fpw.flush()
fpw.close()

[aschone]

Re: Problems writing to a file

For issue #2
The write_line() function adds a CR and LF to each line you may want to try the <file>.write() function instead or build a string with your data then at the end of the script write all the data in one pass.

<file>.Write_line()
http://support.alphasoftware.com/alp...LINE%28%29.htm

The <FILE>.WRITE_LINE() method writes a line of text data ( Text_Line ) to the location of the current file pointer in an open file referenced by the object pointer, <FILE>. The <CR> (Carriage Return) and <LF> (Line Feed) codes are appended to the end of the output.

For issue #1
I am not sure what is going on, If I had some sample data to test with I could help figure out the issue. My initial thought is that you are using a nested for...each and in both instances you declaring your arbitrary placeholder as "tag". Without seeing the input data and being able to test this is the thing that I see that might cause an issue.

[Stan Mathews]

Re: Problems writing to a file

Issue #1. I would do a loop. The stritran_multi() is designed to replace multiple found words with multiple replacement words - multiple search and replace operations on the Input_String, one for each row in Find_Strings. Since you only have one find string you only get one replacement.

[Graham Wickens]

Re: Problems writing to a file

Hi Stan and Andrew,

had a rethink on how to get what I require and it now works thus:

dim search_list as c = " CANX "+crlf()+" NEW "+crlf()+" REREG "+crlf()+" REST "+crlf()+" G-"+crlf()+" EI-"+crlf()+" M-"+crlf()
dim replace_list as c = "	CANX	"+crlf()+"	NEW	"+crlf()+"	REREG	"+crlf()+"	REST	"+crlf()+"	G-"+crlf()+"	EI-"+crlf()+"	M-"+crlf()
dim def_dir as c  = "c:\my databases\aviation\g-info\\"
dim output_file as c  = "g_info_updates.txt"
dim header_text as c  = "modes	reg	msn	type	action	date	notes"
filelist = filefind.get(def_dir-"g-info changes*.txt",0,"pn")
save_to_file(ut(header_text)+crlf(),def_dir-output_file,.f.)
FOR each tag in filelist
	fp = file.open(tag,FILE_RW_SHARED)
	WHILE .not. fp.eof()
		text = fp.read_line()
		IF isnotblank("var->text") THEN
			IF regex_match(left(text,6),"[[:xdigit:]]{6}","egi") THEN
				FOR x = 1 TO 4
					text = *for_each(tag,stritran(tag,"  "," "),text)
				NEXT x
				text = *for_each(tag,stritran_multi(tag,search_list,replace_list),text)
				text  = *for_each(tag,stuff(tag,14,1,"	"),text)
				text = *for_each(tag,stuff(tag,at("/",tag)+3,1,"	"),text)
				save_to_file(ut(text)+crlf(),def_dir-output_file,.t.)
			END IF
		END IF
		statusbar.Set_Text("Processing  "+left(text,6))
	END WHILE
	fp.close()
next
statusbar.clear()

p.s.

Stan, glad to see you are still sleeping with a manual under your pillow