From: Chris Hulan <chris.hulan@...>
Date: 2008-06-19T04:03:47+09:00
Subject: Re: parsing text into usablle numerical data

On Jun 18, 2:10 pm, Cthulhu __ <weedmast...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Still having some problems with this program. I'm getting a TypeError
> when the value of
>
> dx, *dat = line.scan(/\d+/).map.compact
> is nil
>
> Any suggestions on how to handle this? my current implementation looks
> like this:
>
> raw_data = Array.new
> File.foreach files_to_parse[i].to_s do |line|
>     idx, *dat = line.scan(/\d+/).map.compact! {|s| s.to_i}
>     raw_data[idx] = dat
> end
...

looks like the blank line between records is the culprit
could just skip it explicitly:

> File.foreach files_to_parse[i].to_s do |line|
      next if line.strip == '' #skip line if it is empty
>     idx, *dat = line.scan(/\d+/).map.compact! {|s| s.to_i}
>     raw_data[idx] = dat
> end

In response to your question re where idx comes from,
the code in that line is creating an array of ints from the current
line,
then the parallel assignemnt is puting the first number in the array
into idx, and putting the rest
of the array into dat

hth
Chris
cheers