Filtering Columnar Data

[Chris Sheffield]

Gregory,

Try this and see if it works.

	filter tmpData with "*" & tab & myNumber & tab & "*"

There shouldn't be any need to include the preceding or trailing  
tabs, except for the ones directly surrounding the number.

Chris


On Jul 16, 2007, at 9:58 AM, Gregory Lypny wrote:

> Hello Everyone,
>
> I'm struggling with the filter command.  I have tab-delimited data  
> in a field, where each row has at least 56 columns.  I want to  
> filter the data based on a chosen number in that fourth column, for  
> example, to return all lines that have a 9 there.  The fourth  
> column only contains a number from 1 to 10.  The following handler  
> works most of the time.  I put three wild card expressions, lone  
> asterisks separated by tabs, to make sure nothing is being picked  
> up in the first three columns.  The tab and asterisk (and it could  
> be just an *) following myNumber says that it doesn't matter what  
> is in the columns after the fourth.
>
> 	put fld "Data" of this card into tmpData
> 	filter tmpData with "*" & tab & "*" & tab & "*" & tab & myNumber &  
> tab & "*"
>
> The trouble is, the first three wild card expressions are  
> interpreted by Revolution to include tab characters, which means  
> that I'm not necessarily filtering the fourth column!  If a 9  
> appears by itself in column 58, then the filter command will pick  
> it up.  Sigh.
>
> I also tried the following, but I don't think I have the regular  
> expression syntax right.
>
>    filter it with "[A-Z0-9]" & tab & "[0-9]" & tab & "[A-Z]" & tab  
> & myNumber & tab & "*"
>
> I know that my first column always contains five words, two of  
> which are numbers.  I wasn't sure how to represent the four spaces  
> between the words.  The second column is always a seven-digit  
> number.  The third contains first and last names, which will  
> contain at least two words.  This turns up empty.
>
> Any advice would be most appreciated.  If I can't get the RegEx  
> working for me, I know I can resort to a repeat loop and pull out  
> all lines with myNumber in the fourth item.
>
> Regards,
>
> 	Gregory
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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Chris Sheffield
Read Naturally
The Fluency Company
http://www.readnaturally.com
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