SWITCH statement

[new2unix]

Hi,

I am still a little unclear on how to use SWITCH (similar to case in other languages) after looking through the Perl documentation. Basically, base on the string value in a variable called, "$tmp_mode", the script should perform different file I/O task. For example, if $tmp_mode eq "input" then open(FILE, "$file_name" or if $tmp_mode eq "output" then open(FILE, ">$file_name&quot. I can simply use if... but would like to know how can it be done in a case-like fashion.

Thanks

Mike

 

[stillflame]

there is no switch statement in perl, as was the focus of a lecture at last year's perl con, and often found in newsgroup postings. either way, i took this from:

http://www.perl.com/pub/language/style/slide37.html

basically, you use a "for" loop named SWITCH, then each case is a regular expression compared against the value of the variable you pass into it, followed by an '&&' and the block of code you want to execute for each case. the default case is just the last line, with no regular expression, with the code to be run in the default case...
[tt]
SWITCH: for ($tmp_mode)
{
/1/ && do { push @flags, '-e'; last; };
/2/ && do { push @flags, '-h'; last; };
/3/ && do { last; };
die "unknown value for form variable where: `$where'";
}
[/tt] "If you think you're too small to make a difference, try spending a night in a closed tent with a mosquito."