reading data from a text file :)

[speter]

G'Day Folks,

I am reading a data file formatted like:

Code: Pascal  [Select][+][-]

1. ((35,0),
2.   (41, 14), (44, 13), (54, 16), (52, 20), (59, 24), (63, 29), (65, 29), (65, 35), (67, 41), (65, 42),
3.   (54, 39), (59, 44), (59, 50), (63, 55), (63, 65), (57, 59), (52, 48), (48, 59), (41, 57), (33, 65),
4.   (29, 61), (37, 57), (33, 50), (37, 44), (33, 41), (35, 33), (18, 46), (11, 41), (16, 35), ( 7, 24),
5.   ( 9, 16), (19, 11), (27, 14), (33, 12), (41, 14), (0,  0), (0,  0), (0,  0), (0,  0), (0,  0)),
6.  
7.  ((16,0),
8.   (36, 27), (50, 31), (46, 39), (31, 42), (39, 48), (42, 44), (52, 41), (50, 48), (47, 56), (37, 59),
9.   (36, 53), (29, 50), (24, 52), (20, 41), (24, 29), (36, 27), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0),
10.   (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0),
11.   (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0), (0, 0)),
12.  
13. (and so on...)
14.  

at present I am reading each line then parsing the (x,y) points:

Code: Pascal  [Select][+][-]

1.   function getpoint : tpoint;
2.   var
3.     k1,k2,k3 : byte;
4.     n1,n2 : string;
5.   begin
6.     error := '';
7.     k1 := pos('((',s) + 1;
8.     if k1=0 then
9.       k1 := pos('(',s);
10.     k2 := pos(',',s);
11.     k3 := pos('),',s);
12.  
13.     result := point(0,0);
14.     if (k1=0) or (k2=0) or (k3=0) then
15.       error := ' did not find (...),'
16.     else if (k1 < k2) and (k2 < k3) then
17.       begin
18.         n1 := copy(s,k1+1,k2-k1-1);
19.         n2 := copy(s,k2+1,k3-k2-1);
20.         result := point(strtoint(n1),strtoint(n2));
21.       end
22.     else
23.       error := ' not k1 < k2 < k3';
24.   end;

This is working, but I thought I'd do a sanity check to check whether there might be a simpler way.
The data pattern is consistent (1 point, 4 x 10 points, blank line).

cheers
S.

[jamie]

yes there is a much better way..

if that is a constant array field (a Writeable one) then you can write the complete contents out to disk using blockWrite, BlockRead etc..

But keep in mind that you can not change the array structure dynamically and expect it to load properly from one that has a different tree structure..

But if looks like you are stuck on Text files, poor choice for that kind of structure..

[speter]

Jamie, thanks for the reply.

Yes, the data is in a text file.

I eventually converted the data into a comma delimited list; which simplified everything.

cheers
S.