reading multiple files

[jupiler]

Hi,

I'm used to applying Perl scripts to only one file. What do I need to add to them in order to handle a complete folder in which multiple txt files are stored?

Thanks for your help!

J

 

[byleth]

in linux i would have done something like:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;

#grep if your files have a txt extension (or just ls if #you're #going to work with all files)

my @txts = `ls | grep 'txt'`;

foreach my $file (@txts) {
'do whatever you want with the file names'
}

#hope this is helpfull, don't know if the ` works in win

 

[rharsh]

And another way...

my $dir = 'c:/windows/temp/';
my $file_name;

opendir SOMEDIR, $dir or die "Cannot open directory. $!\n";

while ($file_name = readdir SOMEDIR) {
	chomp $file_name;
	# Skip if file is a directory
	next if (-d "$dir$file_name");
	
	# Do some stuff to the file
}

closedir SOMEDIR;

 

[jupiler]

By browsing through the archives, I found some relevant lines:

opendir(FOLDERNAME, "[path of folder]");
@Files=grep(/\.txt/, readdir(FOLDERNAME));
close(FOLDERNAME);

foreach $file (@Files){
[specification of the command]
}

Unfortunately, it does not work so there must be some mistake in the way I want to apply a Perl script on multiple files (since the subscript in the '[specification of the command]' works perfectly ok without the first three lines.)

 

[rharsh]

jupiler - can you give us more info about what you're trying to do to/with the files in the directory?

 

[jupiler]

The txt files in the folder are convered pdf files from which I want to remove the 'hard returns'. For instance:

John is walking
in the park. He is walking
with Mary.

becomes:

John is walking in the park.

He is walking with Mary.

I've written a, I admit, not-so-elegant script which works perfectly ok if I apply it to one file. However, since I have currently 184 files in the folder (a number which is still increasing), I would like to add some lines to my script so that Perl makes the changes to all the files in the folder. This will save me a lot of time.

I will post the script tomorrow so that you can have a look at it.

 

[jupiler]

This is the script. What do I need to change in order to apply it to multiple files? The eventual output files need to have the same name as the input files, but stored in a different folder (e.g. C:\Perl\Corpus\). Any help will be appreciated. Thanks!

print "Name of file (leave out extension)?\n";
$FileName=<STDIN>;
chomp $FileName;

open (INPUT, "$FileName.txt")||die;
@list=<INPUT>;
chomp @list;
close(INPUT);

foreach $line (@list){
  $line=~s/^/ /;
  if($line!~/[A-Za-z]/){
    open(OUTFILE, ">>outfile.txt")||die;
    print OUTFILE " NEW_LINE";
    close(OUTFILE);
  }
  if($line=~/[A-Za-z]/){
    open(OUTFILE, ">>outfile.txt")||die;
    print OUTFILE $line;
    close(OUTFILE);
  }
}

open(INFILE, "outfile.txt")||die;
while(<INFILE>){
  open(OUTPUT, ">>result.txt")||die;
  $_=~s/^[ ]//;
  $_=~s/[ ]+/ /;
  $_=~s/[\t]+/ /;
  $_=~s/ NEW_LINE /\n\n/g;
  $_=~s/\: /:\n\n/g;
  $_=~s/\. /.\n\n/g;
  $_=~s/\? /?\n\n/g;
  $_=~s/\; /;\n\n/g;
  $_=~s/NEW_LINE/\n\n/g;
  print OUTPUT "$_";
}
close(INFILE);
close(OUTPUT);
unlink("outfile.txt");

 

[rharsh]

Here you go - I made an assumption that you wanted a 'result' file for each input file. Give this a shot:

my $dir = './txt_files/';		# Path to txt files
opendir(FOLDERNAME, "$dir") or die;
my @files=grep(/\.txt$/, readdir(FOLDERNAME));
close(FOLDERNAME);

foreach my $file (@files){
	open (INPUT, "$dir$file")||die;
	my @list=<INPUT>;
	chomp @list;
	close(INPUT);

	foreach my $line (@list){
		$line=~s/^/ /;
		if($line!~/[A-Za-z]/){
			open(OUTFILE, ">>outfile.txt")||die;
			print OUTFILE " NEW_LINE";
			close(OUTFILE);
		}
		if($line=~/[A-Za-z]/){
			open(OUTFILE, ">>outfile.txt")||die;
			print OUTFILE $line;
			close(OUTFILE);
		}
	}

	open(INFILE, "outfile.txt")||die;
	open(OUTPUT, "> ${dir}result.${file}")||die;
	while(<INFILE>){
		$_=~s/^[ ]//;
		$_=~s/[ ]+/ /;
		$_=~s/[\t]+/ /;
		$_=~s/ NEW_LINE /\n\n/g;
		$_=~s/\: /:\n\n/g;
		$_=~s/\. /.\n\n/g;
		$_=~s/\? /?\n\n/g;
		$_=~s/\; /;\n\n/g;
		$_=~s/NEW_LINE/\n\n/g;
		print OUTPUT "$_";
	}
	close(INFILE);
	close(OUTPUT);
	unlink("outfile.txt");
}

 

[jupiler]

Thanks. It works nicely. This has been very helpful! Regards.