I'd approach this with DBI and one of the CSV drivers like DBD::CSV. That will save you a lot of code, and leave most of your search in the hands of DBI.

Thanks Zaxo, but how would i write an SQL query that would let me search for a string in any field in the table? also i am not such a big fan of DBD::CSV.

---

monoxide
I am undecided...

Why would you *want* to search for a string in any field? You last field looks like a boolean (on off) your 4th field looks boolean too (male female). If you are searching for emails you would not really want to look there....

Presumably you have a data entry form. This can also be a search form, just add a button that says search. When a user enters data in one or more fields and clicks search all you do is make a query like:

$sth = $dbh->prepare('SELECT foo,bar,baz FROM widget WHERE foo=? AND b
+ar=? AND baz=?');
$sth->execute($foo,$bar,$baz);
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where you dynamically construct the WHERE clause depending on how many fields the user enters data into. To search *all* the fields for the one string the syntax would simply be OR, not AND and include all the fields you want to search.....

$sth = $dbh->prepare('SELECT foo,bar,baz FROM widget WHERE foo=? OR ba
+r=? OR baz=?');
$sth->execute($str,$str,$str);
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DBD::SQLite might suit you better.

cheers

tachyon

If you want to search for a string in any field, just concatenate all your fields into one field and write an SQL which does a "LIKE" search (with appropriate "%" before and after the search term) on that single field.

CountZero

"If you have four groups working on a compiler, you'll get a 4-pass compiler." - Conway's Law

You are slurping the entire file into memory before processing it. This uses more memory than necessary. You only need to read one line at a time from the file. Something like:

while( <DB> ) {
    chomp;
    RECORD: while (m/\G(.*?(?<!\\)(\\\\)*)\Q$dataseperator\E/gs) {
        ...
    }
}
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Now it appears that you seem to be jumping through all sorts of hoops because you want to deal with multiline fields (the last-but-one field?).

If that's the case, you should structure the file differently, to take advantage of Perl's strengths. For instance, you could end each record with a special token, like %% (taking care to escape out %% appearing in the fields as data: e.g. \%\%).

Once you have the datafile in that format, you can set the input line separator to '%%', which will simplify your code considerably.

The routine also appears to be relying on a number of external variables: $dataseperator, $templatetail, $datafile and the like. Basic code hygiene would suggest that you pass these variables in as parameters.

Finally, the routine appears to be doing too much. Not only is it performing a search, it is also printing out stuff, and (horrors!) calling exit to end the program.

A better architecture would have the search routine only performing a search. The printing should be hoisted up a level into the calling code (even if that itself is another routine) and the exit call should be placed at the highest level of the code tree. (Either that, or rename the routine print_header_search_results_and_footer_then_exit).

At least people will then have fair warning of what happens when they call the routine. Or for the maintenance programmer reading the code a few years later. In fact, especially for the maintenance programmer reading the code a few years later.

use strict;

my $str = 'MySql';
while (<DATA>) {
    next if index ($_, $str) == -1;
    split(/\|/);
    for (0..6) {
        print "String \"$str\" found in field $_ of line " . ($.-1) . 
+"\n"
        if index($_[$_], $str) != -1;
    }
}

__DATA__
Test|Subject|test@subject.com|Male|Perl-Database|good|on|
My|Tester|my@tester.com|Female|Perl-Database|very good|on|
Blank|Worker|blank@worker.com|Male|MySql-Database|the best!|off|
Someone|Somewhere|someone@somewhere.com|Female|Mysql-Database|great|of
+f|
Adding|Test|add@test.com|Male|Perl-Database|Great product!|on|
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