[Orca-users] Re: Date_parse routine usage

[Blair Zajac]

Hi Mike,

I'd really recommend reading the new Perl 5 book or learning Perl online.
It's got some great new features beyond Perl 4.  The my makes a lexical
variable that has scope, as in C or C++ variables.  They are faster than
local's and make coding better.

Yes, the sub goes into the configuration file.

The parsedate routine is imported by the Time::ParseDate module.  Check
out the Time::ParseDate manual page.

Best,
Blair

Mike Shannon wrote:
> 
> Blair,
> 
> thanks for the data
> 
> I am a Perl 4 guy
> so some of the things you have here are new to me
> if it is okay could you explain some of them?
> 
> the my command
> what parsesdate ($string) does...
> 
> finally in the config file
> what does the parse_date comand look like
> (or are you saying put the sub right in the config file?)
> 
> thanks!!
> 
> mike
> 
> --- In orca-discuss at y..., Blair Zajac <blair at o...> wrote:
> > Michael,
> >
> > It should look something like this:
> >
> > date_parse      sub {
> >               my $string = $_[0];
> >               $string =~ s/_/ /g;
> >               return parsedate($string);
> >             }
> >
> > The date_parse routine should be called for each line.
> >
> > To debug this, try
> >
> > date_parse      sub {
> >               my $string = $_[0];
> >               $string =~ s/_/ /g;
> >               my $t = parsedate($string);
> >               print "$_[0] => $t => ', scalar localtime($t), "\n";
> >             }
> >
> > Blair
> >
> > Mike Shannon wrote:
> > >
> > > I would like to use the date_parse routine now available in 0.27b1
> > >
> > > I have a few questions about how to include do it though
> > >
> > > my data file has information like this
> > >
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:00:10 20 5
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:00:20 20 4
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:00:30 20 3
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:00:40 20 3
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:00:50 20 3
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:01:00 20 1
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:01:10 20 1
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:01:20 20 2
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:01:30 20 2
> > > 12-Sep-2001_00:01:40 20 2
> > >
> > > this is a snapshot of license usage data starting at midnight
> > > and captured every 10 seconds. the second column is the total
> > > number of licenses, the 3rd the total used at the time of the
> > > snapshot
> > >
> > > I'd like to plot this
> > >
> > > the date_parse routine, should allow me to restructure the
> > > fist column time stamp into epoch time
> > >
> > > but
> > >
> > > I don't know how to tell orca that I have a parse routine
> > > - what/where the routine is
> > >
> > > do I write the routine to be called - like in a sort loop -
> > > so it is called everytime, and it's job is to return the
> > > epoch time - 1 line at a time?
> > >
> > > any help with this would be greatly appreciated
> > >
> > > mike