Geoff Cox <gcox@freeuk.notcomwrote:
Quote:
>hello
>
>Say I am interested in users giving me values for a, b, c and d.
>
>I have a file with all the results - a very big file!
>
>user 1
>a: one
>b: two
>d: four
>
>user 2
>a: one
>b: two
>c: three
>d: four
>
>etc etc
>
>and want to create a file
>
>user a b c d
>1 one two x four
>2 one two three four
>
>etc etc
>
>How do I put in an x for c for user 1, indicating that this user
>didn't submit a value for c?
>
>I slurping the way to do it?
No need for slurping in the whole file. If you know the set of all a, b,
c, d, ... in advance then just go ahead and create the top row. Then
read in the information for each user and print the row for him.
If you don't know the set of all a, b, c, ... in advance then read the
file twice: first pass just to determine the set of a, b, c, ... and the
second pass as above.
jue
