[mike-g2]

Hi,

I'm trying to process a data file, much of the data includes characters like % or & which when when I load into perl using <DATAIN> gets put into a double quoted string so that when I try to print it out it gets all screwed up.

Is there a way to either (a) read the file in as a single quoted literal string or (b) some how convert the double quoted string into a single once after its been read in?

I realize this may be a simple problem for those in the know, but I've spent 1+ hour looking through my books and on the web and can't find a solution.

Any help on this would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Mike

[Chas]

Hey Mike,

Can you post a snippet of your code that reads in the file? Perl doesn't do anything special when reading in files so it sounds like it might be the code used to read in the file.

When you say "when I try to print it out it gets all screwed up" is Perl trying to interpret the &'s and %'s as variables?

~Charlie

[mike-g2]

Hi Charlie,

Thanks for the reply.

I've put the code I'm using at the end along with some of the input file, the error messages, and the output. It's a simple script to convert my bibliography.bib to one with journal names in a standard format.

And when I say it get's all screwed up I mean that when there's a % I get the message

>Invalid conversion in printf: "%M" at ./convert.bib.using.jtitle.pl line 216, <BIBIN> line 1.
and such when ever there's a line with a %

when there's an& I get...
Invalid conversion in printf: "%e" at ./convert.bib.using.jtitle.pl line 216, <BIBIN> line 4806.
and it adds a \ before &

I suspect there's an easy solution if I had more of a clue...

Mike
__________________________________________________ _____________
#define bibliography file with full journal names
my $bibfull = "bibliography.bib";

#define output file for abbreviated names
my $bibabbr = "bibliography.full.bib";


#load $bibfull and $bibabbr
open BIBIN, $bibfull or die "Couldn't open $bibfull file. Exiting...\n";
open BIBOUT, " >$bibabbr";

my $linestart;
my $fulltitle;
my $abbrtitle;
my $temp;

#read through BIBIN file
while (<BIBIN>) { #each line read into $_ variable
#THIS IS SORTA IRRELAVENT TO THE PROBLEM
#test to see if its a title
if (/^\s*journal\s*=\s*(\w*),/) {
$linestart = ' journal = {';
$abbrtitle = $1;
#convert to all lower case
$abbrtitle=~s/(\w+)/\L$1/g;
if($fulltitle = $lctitle_hash{$abbrtitle}){
$linestart .= $fulltitle;
}
else{
#no abbreviation found
print "\nno abbrv. found for $abbrtitle\n";
$abbrtitle=~s/\b(\w)/\U$1/;
$fulltitle= $abbrtitle;
print "Using $fulltitle\n\n";
}
$linestart .= "\},\n";
printf BIBOUT $linestart;
}

#HERE IS WHERE I GET THE PROBLEM
else{
printf BIBOUT $_;
}
}

close BIBIN;
close BIBOUT;


__________________________________________________ ____________________
Debugging output:

DB<1> c
Invalid conversion in printf: "%M" at ./convert.bib.using.jtitle.pl line 216, <BIBIN> line 1.
Use of uninitialized value in printf at ./convert.bib.using.jtitle.pl line 216, <BIBIN> line 408.
Use of uninitialized value in printf at ./convert.bib.using.jtitle.pl line 216, <BIBIN> line 1643.
.
.
.

__________________________________________________ ___________________
Lines in file that are associated with debugging output
1: %Master Bibiligraphy
408: this behavior can be as high as 10-20\% but declines
1643: optical density ratio (%OD), and amino black

strangely, there's a % in line 1641, but it doesn't seem to cause an error...
the line is
1641: volume ratio (%vol) using Melanie II is a better

__________________________________________________ __
Output associated with above errors
1:%Master Bibiligraphy
408: this behavior can be as high as 10-20\0ut declines
1643: optical density ratio (0D), and amino black

and for
1641: volume ratio (l) using Melanie II is a better

[Chas]

Try changing you printf's to print's and see if that helps.

~Charlie

[mike-g2]

**** that was easy! THanks a 10^6!

Mike

[Chas]

No worries. Glad that worked for you

~Charlie