Combine Text Lists

[V00D00]

I have two text files that contain customer information. One is from a specialty lead source, the second is from a generic lead source.

I looking to take these two lists in to a file so that they are ordered in an alternating pattern based on the total number of records for each file.

For example. List A has 5 records. List B has 10 records. I would like to have the new list ordered equally between the records from A and B.

New File Would be Structured Like This.

A - Record From List A
B - Record From List B
B - Record From List B
A - Record From List A
B - Record From List B
B - Record From List B
A - Record From List A
B - Record From List B
B - Record From List B
A - Record From List A
B - Record From List B
B - Record From List B
A - Record From List A
B - Record From List B
B - Record From List B

Any help is always appreciated.

 

[PaulTEG]

You can't really order them unless there's a given assumption that they both match the same distribution, which almost NEVER happens

Read FileA into @arrayA
Read FileB into @arrayB
$counta=$#arrayA;
$countb=$#arrayB;
$ratio=$counta/$countb;
foreach(@arrayB) {
  print $_;
  $counter_b++;
  if ($counter_b%$ratio == 0) {
    print $arrayA[$counter_a];
    $counter_a++;
  }
}

NOT Tested, but should give you a starting point

Paul
------------------------------------
Spend an hour a week on CPAN, helps cure all known programming ailments ;-)

 

[stevexff]

I thought about posting an array based solution, but decided against it as I'd get into trouble with Trojan

 

[V00D00]

I thought about assigning a value to each file that would be used to help disperse the items evenly through the new file. One of the problems I am running in to is that its not just going to be 2 files. It may be 2 files, but it may be up to 10. This way using the values assigned I can track them uniquely in the file and sort accordingly. Now I am looking for a module that will evenly distribute like this.

VD