NAME

       dirfile2ascii — output dirfile database vectors as ASCII text

SYNOPSIS

       dirfile2ascii [ OPTION ]... DIRFILE [ [ -a | -A | -e | -E | -F | -g | -G | -o | -i | -u |
              -x | -X ] FIELD ]...

DESCRIPTION

       Fetches data from a dirfile(5) database specified by DIRFILE and writes  it  as  ASCII  to
       standard  output.   Any number of vector FIELDs may be specified.  Each specified field is
       printed in a separate column.

       Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.

       -d, --delimeter=delim
              separate columns by delim.  (Default: a single space.)

       -f, --first-frame=first_frame-last_frame
              read from frame first_frame to frame last_frame (inclusive).

       -f, --first-frame=first_frame:nframes
              equivalent to --first-frame=first_frame --num-frames=nframes.

       -f, --first-frame=first_frame
              If first_frame >= 0, start reading at frame first_frame.  If first_frame is -1  and
              --num-frames=nframes  is specified, read the last nframes frames.  If --first-frame
              is not specified, reading starts at frame zero.

       -n, --num-frames=nframes
              read at most nframes frames.  If not specified, or if nframes = 0,  all  frames  to
              the end-of-field are read.

       -p, --precision=format
              use  format  to  format  output.   format may contain any of the flag characters, a
              field width, and/or a precision as specified in printf(3).  It may  not  contain  a
              length modifier.

       -q, --quiet
              don't   write  diagnostic  messages  on  standard  error.   (This  is  the  default
              behaviour).

       -s, --skip=frame_skip
              if frame_skip > 0, output only one sample for every frame_skip frames.

       -v, --verbose
              write diagnostic messages on standard error.

       -z, --fill=STRING
              Fill columns which go past the end of their corresponding  field  with  the  string
              STRING.   The  default behaviour is to fill columns with floating-point conversions
              with NaN and columns with integer conversion with 0, which mirrors what occurs when
              an  attempt  is  made  to  print data from before the start of a field.  (Note: the
              default behaviour cannot be reproduced with this option, since STRING is applied to
              all columns, regardless of conversion type.)

       In  addition  to the above, each FIELD argument may be preceded by a short option, one of:
       -a, -A, -e, -E, -F, -g, -G, -i, -o, -u, -x, -X, indicating the conversion to be used.  See
       printf(3)  for  the  meaning of these conversion specifiers.  The output flags, width, and
       precision may be specified by using --precision.  If no conversion specifier is given,  %f
       is used.

       For conversion specifiers %a, %A, %e, %E, %f, %F, %g, %G, data is read from the dirfile as
       double precision floats.  For conversion specifier %i,  data  is  read  as  64-bit  signed
       integers.   For  conversion  specifiers  %o,  %u,  %x, %X, data is read as 64-bit unsigned
       integers.

LIMITATIONS

       No native support for printing complex data is provided.  This may  be  worked  around  by
       using dirfile(5) representation suffixes.  For example, the command

              dirfile2ascii DIRFILE FIELD.r FIELD.i

       will print the real and imaginary parts of the complex valued field FIELD in the first and
       second columns, respectively.

AUTHOR

       dirfile2ascii was written by Matthew Truch and D. V. Wiebe.

REPORTING BUGS

       Please send reports of bugs to getdata-devel@lists.sourceforge.net

       The GetData home page: <http://getdata.sourceforge.net/>

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright © 2010 Matthew Truch.

       dirfile2ascii is licenced under the GNU LPGL version 2.1 or later.

       This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.  There is NO  WARRANTY,
       to the extent permitted by law.

SEE ALSO

       defile(1), dirfile(5), printf(3)