Repeating element string parsing and iteration

[funkfactorus]

Hi all! Noob to perl here...

I have widget with X sections, each having Y dimensions. The amount of sections is dynamic, but amount of dimensions per section is static (let's say it is always 3 dimensions per section).

I have a scalar which is a comma-delimited string of numeric values representing values for all the combinations of section and dimensions, such as:
$data = "value1,value2,value4,value5,value6,value7, ..."
So the first three values belong to first section, values 4-6 belong to second section and so on.

I also have an array with names of the sections.
@sections= ("A, B, C, D");

I also have names for the dimenstions:
@dim_names = ("Xpos", "Ypos", "Zpos")'

I want to build a hash such as:
%section_data = qw/
"A-Xpos" => "value1",
"A-Ypos" => "value2",
"A-Zpos" => "value3",
"B-Xpos" => "value4",
"B-Ypos" => "value5",
...
...
/;


I'm not really sure how to tackle this. I was thinking of maybe doing nested loops for section names and dimension names, chipping away at @data using somehting like /\G.,?/g, but that seem a bit awkward and I would love to know a better way. Any help is much appreciated. Abstract code samples would be great! Thanks in advance!

 

[KevinADC]

A hash of arrays or an array of hashes is the way to go. I would think a hash of arrays would be good since the number of dims is constant per section. Something like:

[url=http://perldoc.perl.org/functions/my.html][black][b]my[/b][/black][/url] [blue]$data[/blue] = [red]"[/red][purple]value1,value2,value3,value4,value5,value6,value7,value8,value9[/purple][red]"[/red][red];[/red]
[black][b]my[/b][/black] [blue]@sections[/blue] = [red]qw([/red][purple]A B C[/purple][red])[/red][red];[/red]
[black][b]my[/b][/black] [blue]@data[/blue] = [url=http://perldoc.perl.org/functions/split.html][black][b]split[/b][/black][/url][red]([/red][red]'[/red][purple],[/purple][red]'[/red],[blue]$data[/blue][red])[/red][red];[/red]
[black][b]my[/b][/black] [blue]%section_data[/blue] = [url=http://perldoc.perl.org/functions/map.html][black][b]map[/b][/black][/url] [red]{[/red][blue]$sections[/blue][red][[/red][blue]$_[/blue][red]][/red] => [red][[/red] [blue]$data[/blue][red][[/red][blue]$_[/blue][red]][/red],[blue]$data[/blue][red][[/red][blue]$_[/blue]+[fuchsia]1[/fuchsia][red]][/red],[blue]$data[/blue][red][[/red][blue]$_[/blue]+[fuchsia]2[/fuchsia][red]][/red] [red]][/red] [red]}[/red] [red]([/red][fuchsia]0..[/fuchsia][blue]$#sections[/blue][red])[/red][red];[/red]

each hash key is an array of the X Y Z positions. To print the values for section 'A':

[url=http://perldoc.perl.org/functions/print.html][black][b]print[/b][/black][/url] [blue]$section_data[/blue][red]{[/red][purple]A[/purple][red]}[/red]->[red][[/red][fuchsia]0[/fuchsia][red]][/red][red];[/red][gray][i]#X[/i][/gray]
[black][b]print[/b][/black] [blue]$section_data[/blue][red]{[/red][purple]A[/purple][red]}[/red]->[red][[/red][fuchsia]1[/fuchsia][red]][/red][red];[/red][gray][i]#Y[/i][/gray]
[black][b]print[/b][/black] [blue]$section_data[/blue][red]{[/red][purple]A[/purple][red]}[/red]->[red][[/red][fuchsia]2[/fuchsia][red]][/red][red];[/red][gray][i]#Z[/i][/gray]

[gray][i]#print all the values:[/i][/gray]

[black][b]print[/b][/black] [blue]@[/blue][red]{[/red] [blue]$section_data[/blue][red]{[/red][purple]A[/purple][red]}[/red] [red]}[/red][red];[/red]

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- Kevin, perl coder unexceptional!

 

[funkfactorus]

Thank you!

 

[KevinADC]

actually, this line:

my %section_data = map {$sections[$_] => [ $data[$_],$data[$_+1],$data[$_+2] ] } (0..$#sections);

should be:

my %section_data = map {$sections[$_] => [ $data[$_*3],$data[$_*3+1],$data[$_*3+2] ] } (0..$#sections);

------------------------------------------
- Kevin, perl coder unexceptional!