Hi monks, i'm trying to get my head around some more complicated data structures and i'm wondering how best to represent my data.

I hope i explain this ok but basically i have the following:

my @user_file_part1=();
my @user_file_part2=();
my @user_file_part3=();

my @test_file_part1=();
my @test_file_part2=();
my @test_file_part3=();

my @trim_file_part1=();
my @trim_file_part2=();
my @trim_file_part3=();

my @user_file=(\@user_file_part1,
               \@user_file_part2,
               \@user_file_part3);

my @test_file=(\@test_file_part1,
               \@test_file_part2,
               \@test_file_part3);

my @trim_file=(\@trim_file_part1,
               \@trim_file_part2,
               \@trim_file_part3);

my %main_file=(
                  USER <= \@user_file,
                  TEST <= \@test_file,
                  TRIM <= \@trim_file,
                  );

[download]

So i have a hash of arrays of arrays if that makes sense (my brain is mush now!)

So my question after all that is, how can i better represent the above code? Do i have to make the array declarations before i take their reference or can i do that at the same time?

Also, if i wanted to push a value onto one of the end arrays, i.e. @user_file_part1, how would i reference it?

Like this?

push(@{$main_file{"USER"}[0]}, $string);

[download]

Thanks in advance!

In reply to How to better represent a complex data structure. by Amblikai

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