Perl and Hash automatic

PB0711 · 09-22-2005, 05:25 PM

Hello,
I am still pretty new to perl and i cannot figure out how to make a hash without physically writting it into the program. Here is the basic of my code (at the bottom). What i am trying to do is find in a file names and place them into a hash. The file will look like;
/firstname{John}
/lastname{smith}
/address{Geneva}
----
/lastname{ ...etc

If someone could just tell me how to make a hash automaticly in a loop that would be all i need. If someone wants to look at my script that would be even better. Thank you in advance

Here is the code
-----------------------------
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

my $In = "listofnames.dat";
open IN, "$In" or die "Problem opening file, $! \n";
my $file;
while (my $line =<IN>){
$file .= $line; # opens file & parse's it to $file
}
close IN;
#print "This is the \$file \t$file \n"; # a check

my @lookup=split(/----/, "$file"); # to split $file by 4 - so each entry is seprate
#print "@lookup \n"; # a check

my %address; # create global hash
my %firstname;
for (my $i=0; $i < @lookup;$i++){
my $where_first = index($lookup[$i], "firstname"); # Uses the indez command
my $where_last = index($lookup[$i], "lastname"); # to find the first char of ""
my $where_add = index($lookup[$i], "address"); #

my $finish_First =index($lookup[$i], "}", $where_first); # finds "}" starting from above
my $finish_Last=index($lookup[$i],"}",$where_last); # $where_? and places it as
my $finish_Add=index($lookup[$i], "}", $where_add); # the last possible char

my $startF = index($lookup[$i], "{", $where_first);# Finds where the name starts
my $startL = index($lookup[$i], "{", $where_last); # using the index command
my $startA = index($lookup[$i], "{", $where_add);

my $firstN = substr($lookup[$i],$where_first+10, $finish_First - ($startF+1)); # finally make the
my $lastN = substr($lookup[$i], $where_last+9, $finish_Last - ($startL+1)); # name and puts into
my $address = substr($lookup[$i], $where_add+8, $finish_Add - ($startA+1)); # string
#print "First\t$firstN\nLastN\t$lastN\nAddress\t$address\n\n"; # a check

$address{ $lastN } =$address; # should make hash
$firstname{ $lastN } = $firstN; #should make hash ????
}
my @k = keys %firstname; #asks for all keys of the hash
my @v = values %firstname;
print "______First Name Hash______\n"; # just for effect
for (my $j=0;$j<@k;$j++){
print "$k[$j]\t$v[$j]\n"; # some printing of the hash
}
#----------same as above but with other hash
my @ka = keys %address;
my @va = values %address;
print "\n _____Address Hash______\n";
for (my $i=0;$i<@ka;$i++){
print "$ka[$i]\t$va[$i]\n";
}

puffinman · 09-22-2005, 08:24 PM

Regular expressions to the rescue! (Also, please post code with the code tags!)

Code:

#!/usr/bin/perl

my %address;
my %firstname;

# this is the input record separator special variable
$/ = "----\n";

while (<>) {
  m/lastname{(.+)}/;
  my $last = $1;

  m/firstname{(.+)}/;
  my $first = $1;

  m/address{(.+)}/;
  my $addr = $1;

  $firstname{$last} = $first;
  $address{$last} = $addr;
}

# print for verification
while ( my ($k,$v) = each %firstname ) {
    print "$k => $v\n";
}
while ( my ($k,$v) = each %address ) {
    print "$k => $v\n";
}

PB0711 · 09-22-2005, 11:25 PM

Oh ok! cool thank you, I see. But what do you mean by code tags? I though i had with the # stuff here to explain line

any who thanks,

PB

puffinman · 09-23-2005, 02:14 AM

Code tags make your code more readable on the forum.

Code:

This text is inside a code tag.

Use the editing buttons directly above where you're typing when you post a message; one of them says "Code".