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For 2023 (and 2024 ...) - we are now fully retired from IT training.
We have made many, many friends over 25 years of teaching about Python, Tcl, Perl, PHP, Lua, Java, C and C++ - and MySQL, Linux and Solaris/SunOS too. Our training notes are now very much out of date, but due to upward compatability most of our examples remain operational and even relevant ad you are welcome to make us if them "as seen" and at your own risk.

Lisa and I (Graham) now live in what was our training centre in Melksham - happy to meet with former delegates here - but do check ahead before coming round. We are far from inactive - rather, enjoying the times that we are retired but still healthy enough in mind and body to be active!

I am also active in many other area and still look after a lot of web sites - you can find an index ((here))
Lots of way of converting 3 letter month abbreviations to numbers

There are certain programming tasks that sound simple but end up fascinating ... they sound straightforward (and probably are), but it turns out there are lots of ways of doing them and you could spend a lot of time working out which was is best. One of those is converting three letter abbreviations for months into numbers. Sounds easy, doesn't it ... well - it is, but which way would you go?

a) A series of "if" and "elseif" statements

b) A string of 36 letters JANFEBMARAPRMAYJUNJULAUGSEPOCTNOVDEC and see where your month name appears in that

c) A switch statement with 12 choices (Obviously not available on languages that don't have a switch)

d) An array (Tcl), Hash (Perl), Table (Lua), Associative array (PHP) or dictionary (Python) where the keys are the names of the month and the values are the month numbers

e) A list (Tcl, Perl), Tuple (Python) , indexed array(PHP) indexed table (Lua) through which you search for the month string and return the index you're on when you find it.

I've put up a sample - in Lua - showing (a), (b) and (d) - it's [here] and comes from discussions on this week's course. There's no switch in Lua - and indeed the Lua user's Wiki sends you back to option (a) - see [here]. And option (e) is so inefficient and horrid that I'm not going to lower myself to write that code in Lua (note, though that the in operator in Python may make it acceptable there!
(written 2010-09-10)

 
Associated topics are indexed as below, or enter http://melksh.am/nnnn for individual articles
U112 - Lua - Other Standard Library features.
  [1847] Lua - IAQ (Infrequently Answered Questions) - (2008-10-18)

Q110 - Object Orientation and General technical topics - Programming Algorithms
  [202] Searching for numbers - (2005-02-04)
  [227] Bellringing and Programming and Objects and Perl - (2005-02-25)
  [642] How similar are two words - (2006-03-11)
  [1157] Speed Networking - a great evening and how we arranged it - (2007-04-21)
  [1187] Updating a page strictly every minute (PHP, Perl) - (2007-05-14)
  [1391] Ordnance Survey Grid Reference to Latitude / Longitude - (2007-10-14)
  [1840] Validating Credit Card Numbers - (2008-10-14)
  [1949] Nuclear Physics comes to our web site - (2008-12-17)
  [2189] Matching disparate referencing systems (MediaWiki, PHP, also Tcl) - (2009-05-19)
  [2259] Grouping rows for a summary report - MySQL and PHP - (2009-06-27)
  [2509] A life lesson from the accuracy of numbers in Excel and Lua - (2009-11-21)
  [2586] And and Or illustrated by locks - (2010-01-17)
  [2617] Comparing floating point numbers - a word of caution and a solution - (2010-02-01)
  [2894] Sorting people by their names - (2010-07-29)
  [2993] Arrays v Lists - what is the difference, why use one or the other - (2010-10-10)
  [3042] Least Common Ancestor - what is it, and a Least Common Ancestor algorithm implemented in Perl - (2010-11-11)
  [3072] Finding elements common to many lists / arrays - (2010-11-26)
  [3093] How many toilet rolls - hotel inventory and useage - (2010-12-18)
  [3102] AND and OR operators - what is the difference between logical and bitwise varieties? - (2010-12-24)
  [3451] Why would you want to use a Perl hash? - (2011-09-20)
  [3620] Finding the total, average, minimum and maximum in a program - (2012-02-22)
  [3662] Finding all the unique lines in a file, using Python or Perl - (2012-03-20)
  [4325] Learning to program - what are algorithms and design patterns? - (2014-11-22)
  [4401] Selecting RECENT and POPULAR news and trends for your web site users - (2015-01-19)
  [4402] Finding sum, minimum, maximum and average in Python (and Ruby) - (2015-01-19)
  [4410] A good example of recursion - a real use in Python - (2015-02-01)
  [4652] Testing new algorithms in PHP - (2016-02-20)
  [4656] Identifying the first and last records in a sequence - (2016-02-26)
  [4707] Some gems from an introduction to Python - (2016-10-29)


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Concluding the interview process
Some other Articles
Melksham Railway Station - new information point
Railway meetings, trips and meetups this autumn
Turning an exercise into the real thing with extreme programming
Concluding the interview process
Lots of way of converting 3 letter month abbreviations to numbers
Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, turns first sod in Melksham Link Canal
Lua - variable function arguments and select
Melksham shamefully makes the national headlines
Teaching Lua to a Perl advocate
Level playing fields, job vacancies, lemons and peaches
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This is a page archived from The Horse's Mouth at http://www.wellho.net/horse/ - the diary and writings of Graham Ellis. Every attempt was made to provide current information at the time the page was written, but things do move forward in our business - new software releases, price changes, new techniques. Please check back via our main site for current courses, prices, versions, etc - any mention of a price in "The Horse's Mouth" cannot be taken as an offer to supply at that price.

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