Re^3: Search and Copy

[mikebailey]

This is what I have so far... open (OUTPUT, ">Results.txt") || die ("Could not open file results.txt; $OS_ERROR"); open( INFILE, "Textfile.txt" )or die("Can not open input file: $!"); while (<INFILE>) { if ($ARG =~ /Something/ ) { print OUTPUT $ARG ; } } close (OUTPUT);

[kennethk]

Again, please use <code> tags and read How do I post a question effectively?

I have found strict to be very helpful to identifying and avoiding bugs in my code -- see Use strict warnings and diagnostics or die. If I were going to write your posted code, it might look more like:

use strict;
use warnings;

open (my $out, ">", "Results.txt") or die ("Could not open file Result
+s.txt; $!");
open (my $in, "<", "Textfile.txt") or die ("Can not open input file: $
+!");
local $/;
while (<$in>) {
    if (/(web site.{250})/i) {
        print $out $1;
    }
}

Changes that I made include:

1. I swapped to lexical file handles and 3 argument open, which are considered better practice for a number of reasons. See perlopentut. In particular, this gives strict more power to help and removes the need for explicit close.
2. I corrected inconsistency between your file name and error message; file names are generally case sensitive.
3. I swapped to slurp mode using $/. Given the large number of characters you are interested in, it is unlikely they will all fall on the same line.
4. Your while(<>) loop read data into $_ not $ARG, so I corrected that.
5. I swapped your regular expression to the regular expression I posted above, with the addition of the s modifier. This makes it so . also matches new lines, and is essential when working in slurp mode.

You may consider going to http://learn.perl.org to gather some learning resources before trying to run too far.

[mikebailey]

open (OUTPUT, ">Results.txt") 

open( INFILE, "Textfile.TXT" )
while (<INFILE>) {
if ($ARG =~ /(Something.{0,250})/ ) {
print OUTPUT $ARG ;
}
}

close (OUTPUT);

The "regexp" suggested is not working.

Thoughts?

[choroba]

The regex would work if you match it against the right variable. Where is $ARG coming from? Use strict and warnings; and if someone gives you a code, taking just a small part of it if you do not understand the rest would probably not work.