TEMP	54.3	65.4	75.2...........
	9.3254	9.265	9.103..........
	9.843	9.743	9.421...............

##</code><code>##

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;

my $num_of_params;

$num_of_params = @ARGV;

if ($num_of_params < 2)   {
    die ("\n You haven't entered enough parameters!!! \n\n");
}

# Declare some variables.

my $line;
my $data;
my @derivative;
my $value;
my $line2;
my @array;
my $difference;
my $number_counter = 0;
my $test;
my $test2;
my $k;
my $i;

open (EXCEL, $ARGV[0]) or die "unable to open file, perl says $!";
open (OUTFILE, ">$ARGV[1]") or die "unable to open file, perl says $!";

  $data = do { local $/; <EXCEL>; };
  $data =~ s/([^\n]) (\n) ([^\n]) /$1$3/g;
  $data =~ s/\n+/\n/g;
  my @data = split /\n/, $data;

  $data[6] =~ s/^1{1}//;                        
  $data[7] =~ s/^13{1}//;
  $data[5] =~ s/TEMP{1}//;

  my @numbers  = split (/\t/, $data[6]);
  my @numbers2 = split (/\t/, $data[7]);
  my @temps = split (/\t/, $data[5]);

  my %differences = ();
  my %differences2 = ();

  my $diff = -1;
  my $diff2 = -1;
  my $index = 0;
  my $d;
  my @d;
  my %hash;

  for ($i = 2; $i < @numbers; $i++)   {
       if (defined ($numbers[$i]) && defined ($numbers [$i-1]))   {
          $d = abs ($numbers [$i] - $numbers [$i-1]);
          $d =~ s/-//g;
          $diff = $d if $diff < $d;
       }

####   this is the main bit where i'm not sure what i'm doing.
#####  I was trying to set up a hash that could look up the corresponding 
###  key value in @temps.
#@d = $d;
#%hash = map {$temps[$_] => $numbers[$_] => $d[$_] } 0 .. $#temps;
}

# this just calculates the biggest difference between two consecutive numbers

print "Greatest difference in the first sample is $diff\n";

  for (my $k = 2; $k < @numbers2; $k++)    {
       if (defined ($numbers2[$k]) && defined ($numbers2 [$k-1]))    {
           my $e = abs ($numbers2 [$k] - $numbers2 [$k -1]);
           $e =~ s/-//g;
           $diff2 = $e if $diff < $e;
       }
   }

print "Greatest difference in the second sample is $diff2\n";

close EXCEL;
close OUTFILE;

exit 0;

##**************************************************************************