Text processing/1: Difference between revisions

So, to handle this, the plan becomes to read the record into a CHARACTER variable, read the date part with a FORMAT ststementstatement working on the first ten characters, and then read the rest of the input via free-format. If the data field is corrupt (say, a letter in place of a digit) the ERR label will be selected. Similarly, when reading from a CHARACTER variable there is no read-next-record available, so if there is a shortage of data (a number is missing) the END label will be selected. A complaint is printed, a HIC counted, and if HIC is not too large, go back and try for the next record. This means that record count no longer relates to the number of values read, so a count of bad values is maintained as well. In the event, no such troublesome records were encountered in this example. An advantage of reading the record into a scratchpad is that any error messages can quote the text of the record. Similarly, tabs could be converted to spaces, etc. but this isn't needed as the free-format reading allows either, and commas. More generally, a much more comprehensive analysis of the record's text could be made should the need arise, most obviously that the date is a valid one and its hyphens are placed as expected. Another useful check is for the appearance of additional text beyond the twenty-four pairs specified - for example, a CRLF has been "lost". Somehow.

In decades of working with (half-)hourly data on the generation and consumption of electricity, it has been evidentdemonstrated that modern data suppliers endlessly demonstrate an inability to stick with a particular format, even one of their own design, and that the daylight savings changeover days (where there are ''not'' twenty-four hours in a day) surprass their competence annually. Persons from a mainframe background do a much more reliable job than those who have only tinkered with spreadsheets.