Formatted file input of integers

Question

I can see how to do low-level file i/o and how to read in
strings in Lingo, but I have a long list/array of numbers(
integers) that I want to read into the program from a file once and
for all at the start of the movie. Then later, I want to use these
integers to control the movie display. Is there any easy way to do
formatted file reads in Lingo, or do I have to write my own
number-parsing routine? Thanks for any help.
John

Answer 1

Here are a couple of handlers that should return a string
whose value() is the original list:
on GetStringList(aList)
-- INPUT: <aList> should be a linear or property list
-- OUTPUT: Returns a string whose value is the original
list. The
-- use of embedded quotes in strings and the appearance of
-- <Void> are explicitly treated. Void in sublists
will
-- be correctly treated, but strings with embedded quotes
-- will only be treated in the outermost values
if listP(aList) then
aList = aList.duplicate() -- so that we don't change the
original
i = aList.count
repeat while i
tValue = aList
case ilk(tValue) of
#string:
if tValue contains QUOTE then
-- Replace embedded quotes
aList =
ReplaceAll(tValue,QUOTE,QUOTE&"&QUOTE&"&QUOTE)
end if
end case
i = i - 1
end repeat
end if
tString = string(aList)
-- Replace any occurrences of <Void> with Void
tString = ReplaceAll(tString, "<Void>", "Void")
return tString
end GetStringList
on ReplaceAll(aString, aSubString, aReplacement)
-- INPUT: <aString> is the main string to search in
-- <aSubString> is a string which may appear in
<aString>
-- <aReplacement> is a string which is to replace all
-- occurrences of <aSubString> in <aString>
-- OUTPUT: returns an updated version of <aString>
where all
-- occurrences of <aSubString> have been replaced by
-- <aReplacement>
if aSubString = "" then
return aString
end if
tTreatedString = ""
tLengthAdjust = the number of chars of aSubString - 1
repeat while TRUE
tOffset = offset(aSubString, aString)
if tOffset then
if tOffset - 1 then
put chars(aString, 1, (tOffset - 1)) after tTreatedString
end if
put aReplacement after tTreatedString
delete char 1 to (tOffset + tLengthAdjust) of aString
else -- there are no more occurrences
put aString after tTreatedString
return tTreatedString
end if
end repeat
end ReplaceAll