Save two values in collection and compare

[Gilbert Rebhan]

Hi,

i need some ideas before i'll get my feet wet.

Situation =

i have to parse n logfiles from one whole day.

Those logs have lines with a filename and 1 of 3
possible attributes, i.e format simplified :

Updated ... path/to/file ...
New ... path/to/file ...
Deleted ... path/to/file ...

OK, parsing with regular expressions works fine,
i get the attribute and the filename.

Problem =

It may occur that one file occurs with attribute
Deleted in a log, but in the next log it appears
with New again.

I need a structure / collection i write the filename
with the attribute to and make sure, if it appeared
already, it isn't saved a second time.

My idea =

i have to start from the last log, reading the most
recent log, as the last appearence of a file attribute
should win/ is the valid one, i.e.

FileA appears in last log with attribute New|Updated, so i
write FileA with New/Updated or copytrue in my collection.
Then reading the next log, if FileA appears again with Deleted
i have to skip it.

So need a routine that starts from the most recent logfile,
writes the filename + attributes into a collection and
checks when reading the next log, if filename already
is saved, if yes ignore, if no save with attribute.

Questions =

What kind of collection is best for that purpose ?

Thanks for any hint!!

Regards, Gilbert

 

[Boudewijn Dijkstra]

What kind of collection is best for that purpose ?

Sounds like you want to have Set-like behaviour.