Re: Re: Numerical value of strings

You might want to change your regex to /(-?\d+(?:\.\d*)?)/ in case there is a decimal or negative number in there and not just all positive integers.

flounder

Comment on Re: Re: Numerical value of strings Download Code

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Re: Re: Re: Numerical value of strings by Limbic~Region (Chancellor) on Aug 05, 2003 at 19:56 UTC
flounder99, While this increases the possibilities there are still some missing. If I were tackling this problem, I would do one of the following: Correct whatever mechanism was causing/allowing the ~~leading spaces~~ "Malformed UTF-8 character" Write a util for stripping the ~~leading spaces~~ "Malformed UTF-8 characters" and saving changes before running the secondary script Delegate the number determination to a modified form of the looks_like_a_number from Scalar::Util. See copy/pasted excerpt below: `sub looks_like_number { local $_ = shift; # checks from perlfaq4 return 1 unless defined; return 1 if (/^[+-]?\d+$/); # is a +/- integer return 1 if (/^([+-]?)(?=\d\|\.\d)\d(\.\d)?([Ee]([+-]?\d+))?$/); # +a C float return 1 if ($] >= 5.008 and /^(Inf(inity)?\|NaN)$/i) or ($] >= 5.006 +001 and /^Inf$/i); 0; }` [download] In all honesty, I would do steps 1 and 2 once and incorporate 3 as part of my regular script to ensure my data didn't get polluted with erroneous entries. Cheers - L~R	[reply] [d/l]

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Re: Re: Re: Numerical value of strings
by Limbic~Region (Chancellor) on Aug 05, 2003 at 19:56 UTC

flounder99

Correct whatever mechanism was causing/allowing the ~~leading spaces~~ "Malformed UTF-8 character"
Write a util for stripping the ~~leading spaces~~ "Malformed UTF-8 characters" and saving changes before running the secondary script

Delegate the number determination to a modified form of the looks_like_a_number from Scalar::Util. See copy/pasted excerpt below:

sub looks_like_number {
  local $_ = shift;

  # checks from perlfaq4
  return 1 unless defined;
  return 1 if (/^[+-]?\d+$/); # is a +/- integer
  return 1 if (/^([+-]?)(?=\d|\.\d)\d*(\.\d*)?([Ee]([+-]?\d+))?$/); # 
+a C float
  return 1 if ($] >= 5.008 and /^(Inf(inity)?|NaN)$/i) or ($] >= 5.006
+001 and /^Inf$/i);

  0;
}
[download]

In all honesty, I would do steps 1 and 2 once and incorporate 3 as part of my regular script to ensure my data didn't get polluted with erroneous entries.

Cheers - L~R

[reply]
[d/l]