Re: How to convert a string to strnum?

[Peng Yu]

My point is that it may be better to include such a function by
default instead of relying on users to repetitively define it on their
own.

On 9/5/21, Neil R. Ormos <ormos-gnulists17@ormos.org> wrote:
> Peng Yu wrote:
>> Neil R. Ormos wrote:
>>> Peng Yu wrote:
>
>>>> https://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/manual/html_node/Variable-Typing.html
>>>> $ awk -e 'BEGIN { x="1e6"; print typeof(x), typeof(strtonum(x)) }'
>>>> string number
>>>> I can only convert a string to a number. But I
>>>> don't find a way to convert a string to a
>>>> strnum. Is there a way to do so?
>
>>> shell> gawk 'BEGIN{ a="1e6"; z=match(a, /.*/, r); print "a:", typeof(a),
>>> a;
>>> print "r:", typeof(r[0]), r[0], r[0]*1;}'
>
>>> a: string 1e6
>>> r: strnum 1e6 1000000
>
>>> Note that the answer the poster sought was in the
>>> very section of the manual the poster himself/herself
>>> cited:
>
>>> | [...] Fields, getline input, FILENAME, ARGV
>>> | elements, ENVIRON elements, and the elements of
>>> | an array created by match(), split(), and
>>> | patsplit() that are numeric strings have the
>>> | strnum attribute. [...]
>
>> It sounds like a function named like
>> str2strnum(), other a hack using match(), is
>> more intuitive.
>
> Attention is yet again drawn to the manual.
> Section 9.2 (currently), entitled "User-Defined
> Functions," explains how one can define a function
> and assign a nearly arbitrary name to it.
>
> It is observed that the name "str2strnum" is
> available for use as a user-defined function in
> gawk version 5.1.0.
>
>


-- 
Regards,
Peng