How to split complex text file in C#?

Question

I have a text file as below and I want to get only the numbers below column rank:

SKYRain  LND(4)    VA(x)      ZZ(x)     NUM(n)   Rank  ll ListOfNames                                                   
-------  ------    -----      -----     ------   ----  -- -----------                                                   
   1002      75   283680     185836   1,111.50  19268   1 Jack                         
   4308    1100   175896     195404     751.70   6384   1 Sara                                                      
   3070     252  1044788     884160     682.94  18924   1 Robert                                                        
   3187     206   852280      97932     535.83  16472   1 Harry

I just want the numbers below the rank below:

Is there a way?

Yes, there is a way and it's pretty simple. And your text file is not complex. It has fixed width columns — Thomas Weller, Jan 05 '23 at 18:21
@ThomasWeller Well, there is a long distance between them, I tried to fill the space with a letter and then split them, but I couldn't — Inferno, Jan 05 '23 at 18:25
Why do you think it's easier to split on a letter instead of a space? — Thomas Weller, Jan 05 '23 at 18:28
You don't even need to split at all. You could just use fixed index. — Fildor, Jan 05 '23 at 18:43

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 05 '23 at 18:25

3

You have a fixed width text file. Just can simply use SubString():

public class Program{
    public static void Main(){
        string aLineOfYourTextFile = "   1002      75   283680     185836   1,111.50  19268   1 Jack ";
        Console.WriteLine(aLineOfYourTextFile.Substring(48,5));
    }
}

You can also use Split():

public class Program{
    public static void Main(){
        string aLineOfYourTextFile = "   1002      75   283680     185836   1,111.50  19268   1 Jack ";
        var columns = aLineOfYourTextFile.Split(new[]{" "}, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
        Console.WriteLine(columns[5]);
    }
}

answered Jan 05 '23 at 18:25

Thomas Weller

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But the numbers and distances are not fixed and change in later times – Inferno Jan 05 '23 at 18:30
@Inferno The Split() method should still work – Thomas Weller Jan 05 '23 at 18:31
While I believe reading the file as regular CSV is much better option (and I picked duplicate for that), indeed String.Split is an approach to this particular case. @Inferno please note that it is expected to try things out before asking a question (including asking for clarification in the comment) - I don't see why you still have that question after running the code suggested by Thomas Weller. – Alexei Levenkov Jan 05 '23 at 18:37
@ThomasWeller The second code worked, Thanks – Inferno Jan 05 '23 at 19:27

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 05 '23 at 18:24

0

read and skip 2 lines
read next line, split on " ", select 5th entry, convert to int
repeat above till EOF

answered Jan 05 '23 at 18:24

pm100

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How to split complex text file in C#?

2 Answers2