Thread: Another CSV parsing question

Hello all,

I'm hoping I'm not beating a dead horse here (which is completely possible) but I am unable to figure out what I'm doing wrong with this CSV parsing code. I have a CSV file that has null fields, but will always have the commas for those fields. So, what we get is a file that has the current structure:

1,2,3,4,,,,,,6,7,,,7,8,,,8

It could also all be filled in:

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9

They will always have the same number of columns though (even though my example did not). The code I'm using to parse this file is shown below:

Code:

#include <stdio.h>   /* required for file operations */
#include <string.h>

FILE *fr;            /* declare the file pointer */


main()


{
   char line[2500];
   char delims[] = ",";
   char *result = NULL;
   int count = 0;


    fr = fopen ("testfile", "r");


   /* fr = fopen ("tmpfile", "r");   open the file for reading */
   /* elapsed.dta is the name of the file */
   /* "rt" means open the file for reading text */


   while(fgets(line, 2500, fr) != NULL)
   {
        if (line[0] == '#') {
                continue;
        }
        result = strtok(line, delims);
        while (result != NULL) {
                if (count == 11) {
                        printf("result: %s\n", result);
                        count = 0;
                } else {
                        count+=1;
                }
                result = strtok(NULL, delims);
        }
        count = 0;
   }
   fclose(fr);  /* close the file prior to exiting the routine */
} /*of main*/

I've tested files with all the columns filled out in every line and this code seems to work. So I guess my question is, how do I test for a field having null characters such that I can print the REAL 11th field of the csv file's line? Hopefully this is a clear question, if you need any clarification, please let me know and I will provide as much data as I can!

You don't have a null character in that situation. You have an empty string. These are different concepts.

That said, you apparently know how to check the value of a character. Why don't you start by trying to check the distance between delimiters as they are found?

Soma

So, for instance, parse the line with a for loop instead of strtok?