PLIPARSE

PLIPARSE parses a character string into substrings.

There must at least 3 arguments and no more than 64.

The first argument is the input string to be parsed (which can be any expression with CHARACTER type).

The arguments after that input string consist of an even number of pairs with each pair consisting of

an even number of pairs with each pair consisting of a target reference (or an *) and a separator
an optional, last target argument that must be a reference (or * )

The first target argument after the first separator that is not found is assigned the remaining input and any remaining target arguments are assigned the quotation marks.

Any target argument that is not an * must have CHARACTER type and must be ASSIGNABLE.

The separators must all have CHARACTER type.

Example 1

Given

    dcl x1    char(16) varying;
    dcl x2    char(16) varying;
    dcl x3    char(16) varying;
    dcl x4    char(16) varying;

    dcl s1    char value('KEY:');
    dcl s2    char value('--');
    dcl s3    char value('-');

    input = '31415KEY:0123--45678-9';

    call pliparse( input, x1, s1, x2, s2, x3, s3, x4  );

the target arguments will have the following values

    x1 = '31415';
    x2 = '0123';
    x3 = '45678';
    x4 = '9';

Example 2

In this example, "input" differs from the example above in that there is no "--"

Given

    dcl x1    char(16) varying;
    dcl x2    char(16) varying;
    dcl x3    char(16) varying;
    dcl x4    char(16) varying;

    dcl s1    char value('KEY:');
    dcl s2    char value('--');
    dcl s3    char value('-');

    input = '31415KEY:0123-45678-9';

    call pliparse( input, x1, s1, x2, s2, x3, s3, x4  );

the target arguments will have the following values

    x1 = '31415';
    x2 = '0123-45678-9';
    x3 = '';
    x4 = '';

Example 3

Given

    dcl x1    char(16) varying;
    dcl x2    char(16) varying;
    dcl x3    char(16) varying;
    dcl x4    char(16) varying;

    input = ' Alex  Bruno';

    call pliparse( input, x1, ' ', x2, ' ', x3, ' ', x4  );

the target arguments will have the following values


    x1 = '';
    x2 = 'Alex';
    x3 = '';
    x4 = 'Bruno';

Example 4

Given

    dcl x1    char(16) varying;
    dcl x2    char(16) varying;
    dcl x3    char(16) varying;
    dcl x4    char(16) varying;
    input = collapse( ' Alex  Bruno', ' ' );

    call pliparse( input, x1, ' ', x2, ' ', x3, ' ', x4  );

the target arguments will have the following values


    x1 = 'Alex';
    x2 = 'Bruno';
    x3 = '';
    x4 = '';