hi,
> I know that each block always starts with and A in the first position of
> the first line and ends with a T in the last position of the last line.
isnt it a T in the first position of the last row of the set?
> I know that the second line starts with a B, and the data in the 5th space
> on this line is the e-mail address, which is what I ultimately want.
> However,...
only line with a B in the bigining in set?
> I am trying to get a list of email addresses for people who have ordered
> products that begin with ADV. These can appear in multiple I lines.
> Therefore you can never predict how many lines make up 1 order block.
What about:
#! /usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
my @email;
open (FH, "<complex.txt") or die "$!";
local $/ = "\nA,"; # make \nA, the record seperator
while(<FH>){ # read the next record
my @fields = split ",|\n", $_; # split at , or \n
my $b_index; # 0 for every new record
for (my $i=0; $i<=$#fields; $i++){
if ($fields[$i] eq "B") {$b_index=$i; next;}
elsif ($fields[$i] =~ /^ADV_.*/) {push @email, $fields[$b_index+4];
last;}
}
}
works on the sample you provided.
$/ (see perlvar) is the record seperator, usually \n.
If really T would be the last char i the last row of the set, you could use "T
\n" as $/
The way I do it assumes that the first and only first line of each set beginns
with an A (and falsly buts that A at the end of the privious record, but
doesnt matter for the aim her, does it?)
The push assumes that there are always exactly 5 records between B and email
and that this is the only line with a B in record (and comes before the lines
with ADV_
lot of assumtions.
Im sure there is better ways to do that - might be a strat, though.
> "Online ordering is now available. Visit http://insidersadvantage.com for
> details."
Uh, given from your question, I better dont,, eh?
Good luck, Wolf
--
To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<http://learn.perl.org/> <http://learn.perl.org/first-response>
