Question

My file looks like this:

<MAIN>  
  <SUB_MAIN>one</SUB_MAIN>  
  <VER>version#</VER>  
  (OTHER STUFF...)  
  <LOCATION>PATH</LOCATION>  
</MAIN>

<MAIN>  
  <SUB_MAIN>two</SUB_MAIN>  
  <VER>version#</VER>  
  (OTHER STUFF...)  
  <LOC>PATH</LOC>  
</MAIN>

What I want to do is to search for the value of SUB_MAIN lets say one, and if I find it then look for the value of LOCATION. Go to that location do some syncing get a new version from there and update the VER information.

My current code has like three loops and is ugly. The skeleton is like this:

$value = "one|two|three";

# for each line in file
while ($line < @FileDat) {

    # see if it is a sub module?   
    if ( $line =~ /\<SUB_MAIN\>$value\<\/SUB_MAIN\>/ ) 
    {   
       $found_it = 0;

        while (!$found_it) 
        {       
            $lineNum++;     
            if ( $FileDat[$lineNum] =~ /\<VER\>\d+\<\/VER\>/ ) 
            {
                $currIndex = $lineNum;

                while(1)
                {
                   $lineNum++;
                   if ( $FileDat[$lineNum] =~ /\<LOC\>(.+)\<\/LOC\>/ ) 
                    {   #DO SOME STUFF...
                        $found_it = 1;
                        last;
                    }
                }               
                        #replace version #
                $FileDat[$currIndex] = "    <VER>$latestChangeList</VER>\n";
            }
        }
    }
    $lineNum++;
}

# write the modified array to new file
print NEWCFGFILEPTR @FileDat;

close(OPEN_FILES);

How can I make it better?
Thank you.

Answer 1

Use XML::Simple. There is no need to reinvent the wheel, unless you are planning on making it better, which I highly doubt that this is your task.