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Hi fellow Perl Monks,

I am trying to get text/number in a html file then store them into a variable. I know that HTML::TableExtract or some other module might have easier way to do this. But for now, I want to learn and apply HTML::Parser and regex first.

This is part of my failed attempt perl script, it got errors like bareword found (might be runaway multi-line) and can't use global $1 in my. At the beginning of the script, it prompt user for input then store them into a variable. For now, I am writing the part for the script to be able to reads the $ca html file and find match. Then next part of the script will continue for the other states' html file.

use HMTL::Parser;

my $ca = "california.html";

open (my $f1, "<" , $ca) || die ("Can't open file : california.html");

while (<$f1>){
        if (my $text =~ /Employee\sA</th><th>.\d</){
                my $one = $1;
        }elsif (my $text =~ /Employee\sB</th><th>.\d</){
                my $two = $1;
        }elsif (my $text =~ /Employee\sC</th><th>.\d</){
                my $three = $1;
        }
}

close ($f1);
[download]

Below are a few lines from two different html files.

the employee A/B/C is fixed. But for sometimes there will be no value 
+between the <th> tag.

</tr></table></body><body bgcolor="black"><h1>
Summary</h1><table border="1"><tr><th>Employee A</th><th>-0.82</th>
</tr><tr><th>Employee B</th><th>-5.02</th>
</tr><tr><th>Employee C</th><th>19</th>

</tr></table></body><body bgcolor="black"><h1>
Summary</h1><table border="1"><tr><th>Employee A</th><th></th>
</tr><tr><th>Employee B</th><th></th>
</tr><tr><th>Employee C</th><th></th>
[download]

And I've been trying to get the value into the variable, so that I could use them later. $one = -0.82 $two = -5.02 $three = 19

Apologize in advance for the fail attempt of perl script that I wrote. I could understand if it's too painful to watch. But kindly point out my mistake and guide me the correct way. Thank you so much.

P/S: You could say that I am a slow learner because after a few days of self-learning perl, I still could't quite pick up how this string-matching works. I'm using perl v5.8.8

In reply to HTML::Parser / Regex by MissPerl

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