Clarity

Hi,

I have a pretty general question about delimiter types that are allowed when writing to clarity using xog.

I usually would use a tab or comma delimiter, but I've been given some pretty funky data that is not as neat as what I am used to. I just want to know if there are any other types of delimiters that I could use, or possible even pull straight from a MS Excel spreadsheet before I attempt to go through and reorganize several sets of data that do not belong to me.

Thanks,

Tyra

You can use all different sorts of delimiters.

Here is how you can use the pipe:

<files:readFile fileName="${vFileName}" delimiter="\|" var="vResourceData" embedded="false"/>
 

Does this help?

Thanks Chris.

My problem is that I only know of tab delimited and comma delimited files. In this particular case I have a bunch of crazy, decentralized spreadsheets and I was trying to figure out a way to read from these files without having to reorganize the data since I am not the data owner. Usually tab and comma delimited files work fine when the data is "pretty", but this time around the data is a bit messy. I am trying to figure out if there is a better delimiter option for trying to write from these particular spreadsheets before I get permission to condense the data or have the data owners try to reformat it.

It would be perfect if there was a way to read directly from the excel spreadsheet, but I'm not sure if that is possible.

I also like using pipe ‘|’ delimited strings as ‘,’ and ‘tab’ often show up in text fields.

Save your Excel file with | separator:

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/21456/export-or-save-excel-files-with-pipe-or-other-delimiters-instead-of-commas/

then use Chris' <files:readFile>

<files:readFile fileName="${vFileName}" delimiter="\|" var="vResourceData" embedded="false"/>

I often read directly from Excel files (mostly if the data is spread across multiple sheets or isn't is a friendly row format) but it involes writting a .NET or Java program in which Ithe Excel file is read and then call the appropriate Clarity Web Services to load the data.

V/r,

Gene