Re: learning perl 3rd vs 4th

On Sun, 2008-05-25 at 10:07 -0700, AndrewMcHorney wrote:
> Hello
> 
> I have been reading files with the following command:
> 
> @source_lines = (<SOURCE_FILE>);
> 

You'd want to use 

$source_line = <SOURCE_FILE>

to get a single record at a time from the handle

> This has worked until I started reading some very large files. Is 
> there a better way to read files? The files I am trying to read now 
> are about 300 megabytes in size. The bad news is that the spec has no 
> carriage returns or line feeds. 

perldoc perlvar - Check the section on the input record seperator

> We have no control over the spec. I 
> need to replace a few characters in the file.
> 
> Andrew


If you need more precise control also look into the IO Modules