Multidimensional array help

[h0vis]

Hi,

I'm emulating a multidimensional array in awk and getting strange results from the length(arrayname) command.

What am I doing wrong? How do I fix it?

Here's my test code:
BEGIN {
TABLE["cfg",0]="0"
TABLE["cfg",1]="1"
TABLE["cfg",2]="2"
TABLE["cfg",3]="3"
TABLE["cfg",4]="4"
TABLE["cfg",5]="5"
TABLE["tst",0]="0"
TABLE["tst",1]="1"
TABLE["tst",2]="2"
TABLE["tst",3]="3"
TABLE["tst",4]="4"
TABLE["tst",5]="5"
TABLE["tst",6]="6"
TABLE["tst",7]="7"
TABLE["tst",8]="8"
TABLE["tst",9]="9"
TABLE["tst",10]="10"
}

END {
TST="tst"
print "length(TABLE)="length(TABLE)
for( i=0; i<length(TABLE); i++ ) {
print "length(TABLE)="length(TABLE)" TABLE["TST","i"]="TABLE[TST,i]
if ( i>20 ) {print "Terminating because it is broken"; break }
}
}

This produces this:
length(TABLE)=17
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,1]=1
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,2]=2
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,3]=3
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,4]=4
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,5]=5
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,6]=6
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,7]=7
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,8]=8
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,9]=9
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,10]=10
length(TABLE)=17 TABLE[tst,11]=
length(TABLE)=18 TABLE[tst,12]=
length(TABLE)=19 TABLE[tst,13]=
length(TABLE)=20 TABLE[tst,14]=
length(TABLE)=21 TABLE[tst,15]=
length(TABLE)=22 TABLE[tst,16]=
length(TABLE)=23 TABLE[tst,17]=
length(TABLE)=24 TABLE[tst,18]=
length(TABLE)=25 TABLE[tst,19]=
length(TABLE)=26 TABLE[tst,20]=
length(TABLE)=27 TABLE[tst,21]=
Terminating because it is broken

Notice how the length result starts incrementing after the 11th iteration, this I do not understand!!

Any ideas?

Regards,
Andrew

 

[Annihilannic]

length() is for measuring string lengths, not array lengths. You'll need to keep track of the number or elements in the array yourself, or use the for (index in array) construct (which I realise is not ideal for multi-dimensional arrays).

Annihilannic.

 

[feherke]

Hi

Do as Annihilannic suggested.

Just one thing to mention, although it is not a big help for multidimensional arrays :

Starting with version 3.1.5, as a non-standard extension, with an array argument, length() returns the number of elements in the array.

Feherke.

http://rootshell.be/~feherke/

 

[booke]

awk '
{myarray[$1 $3]}
END {
n=asorti(myarray)
for(i=1; i<=n; i++)
print length(myarray), myarray
}'