Question

I am taking the output from a file in tabular form.

This is how the file.txt will look like. suppose its a 4*4 matrix

1 2 3 4
a b c d
e f g h
i j k l

Now i want to fetch a particular element of the table say 2nd row and 3rd column. I am using the below code but i am not getting the ouput.

I am storing the table in a array and taking the ref of it.

open(FH, "file.txt);
@Table = <FH>;
close FH;
$ref = \@Table;
print "${$ref[2][3]}";

The ouput should be “c”

Please tell me why ouput is not coming

Answer 1

Here is a code that works as you want:

# ALWAYS use these 2 lines at the begining of your programs
use strict;
use warnings;

my $file = 'file.txt';
# use lexical file handler, 3 arg open and test if open is OK
open my $fh, '<', $file or die "unable to open '$file' for reading:$!";
my @Table;
while(<$fh>) {
    push @Table,[split];
}
close $fh;
my $ref = \@Table;
# this prints the third element of the second line
# array index start at 0
print $ref->[1][2];

output:

c