Hello,

I have two flatfile databases (let's call them file1 and file2), each with a number of lines. Say, file1 has 2 lines, and file 2 has 4 lines. Each line in each database has exactly the same delimited fields. I need to keep the 2 files separate, though.

I want to take the first line in file1, and then compare it with each of the 4 lines in file2, to see which fields are the same. So out of 10 possible fields, line 1 in file1 might have 6 matches with line 1 file2, 3 matches with line 2 file2, 7 matches with line 3 file2, and 1 match with line4 file2. I then need to be able to list the number of matches for each line of file 2 with line 1 file 1, and state what the matches are.

Once that's done, I want to repeat the above paragraph for the second line in file1. So, I need to treat each line in file 1 separately, but I need to compare it with every line in file 2.

The output might be: 

Line 1 of File 1 has 6 matches with file2line1. These are...
Line 1 of File 1 has 3 matches with file2line2. These are...
etc etc etc

Line 2 of File 1 has 8 matches with file2line1. These are...
etc etc etc

[download]

Is this possible? Is it easy? I have been trying to do it using foreach loops, but my brain can't handle the logic at this stage.

Any ideas?

Thanks

edit - Petruchio Tue Oct 16 11:37:04 UTC 2001: Added markup.

In reply to Comparing fields in 1 database with fields in another by rline

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