{"id":55813,"date":"2008-04-10T01:01:00","date_gmt":"2008-04-10T01:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.technet.microsoft.com\/heyscriptingguy\/2008\/04\/10\/hey-scripting-guy-how-can-i-conditionally-add-lines-to-a-text-file\/"},"modified":"2008-04-10T01:01:00","modified_gmt":"2008-04-10T01:01:00","slug":"hey-scripting-guy-how-can-i-conditionally-add-lines-to-a-text-file","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/hey-scripting-guy-how-can-i-conditionally-add-lines-to-a-text-file\/","title":{"rendered":"Hey, Scripting Guy! How Can I Conditionally Add Lines to a Text File?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Hey, <\/p>\n

Hey, Scripting Guy! I need a script that can read a file and, based on the contents, insert some additional lines of text into that file. Can you help me with that?
— JS<\/p>\n

\"Spacer\"\"Hey,\"Script<\/a> <\/p>\n

Hey, JS. We\u2019re sure that most of you have heard by now that Microsoft has made an offer to buy Yahoo<\/b>!<\/b><\/a>, an offer currently valued at around $42 billion. (Because the offer is based, in part, on stock prices the value of the deal tends to fluctuate on a daily basis.) So far, however, Yahoo! has held out for an even better<\/i> deal, noting in a letter to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, \u201cWe are steadfast in our commitment to choosing a path that maximizes stockholder value and we will not allow you or anyone else to acquire the company for anything less than its full value.\u201d <\/p>\n

Because, obviously, a company that doesn\u2019t actually make<\/i> anything (including money) is worth way more than $42 billion.<\/p>\n\n<\/thead>\n\n\n
\n

Ed<\/b>itor\u2019s Note:<\/b> Yes, it appears the Scripting Guy who writes this column is trying to get himself (and the Scripting Editor) into trouble once again. Last time the Scripting Guy who writes this column even mentioned<\/i> another popular Web site that article was removed immediately. Once people see what\u2019s in here, well \u2026 read quickly and assume you\u2019re one of the few who will actually see what\u2019s in here.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

<\/div>\n

Microsoft has yet to respond to this latest salvo from Yahoo!, which can mean only one thing: it\u2019s time for the Scripting Guys to step in. Obviously money is not important to the folks at Yahoo!; if it was, they would take the $42 billion and run. Instead, they must be holding out for something better and more meaningful than money. Which is why the Scripting Guys have decided to enter the negotiations: if Yahoo! will give us the entire company, in turn, we will give every Yahoo! shareholder their very own Dr. Scripto bobblehead doll<\/b><\/a>. That\u2019s something that even $42 billion can\u2019t buy.<\/p>\n\n<\/thead>\n\n\n
\n

Note<\/b>. Well, OK, if you want to get technical, $42 billion would actually buy you over 4 billion<\/i> Dr. Scripto bobblehead dolls. But let\u2019s not tell anyone at Yahoo! that, OK?<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

<\/div>\n

At any rate, if anyone from the Yahoo! board of directors is reading this, drop us a line and let us know what you think. We should note, however, that this offer is<\/i> non-negotiable. That\u2019s not because we aren\u2019t willing to negotiate, it\u2019s just because we don\u2019t have anything other than a few bobbleheads we can negotiate with. The Scripting Editor says she\u2019s willing to toss her Lexus into the deal, but it would be up to you guys to figure out who got to drive it, and when.<\/p>\n\n<\/thead>\n\n\n
\n

Note<\/b>. OK, so the Scripting Editor didn\u2019t actually say<\/i> she would toss her Lexus into the deal, in part because we didn\u2019t actually ask her. But the Scripting Editor\u2019s a team player, and we don\u2019t expect to have any problems with her.<\/p>\n

Well, not unless she finds out about this.<\/p>\n

Ed<\/b>itor\u2019s Note:<\/b> The Scripting Editor is going to need her Lexus so she has a place to live after this article is discovered.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

<\/div>\n

Of course, many of you are probably concerned about this impending deal. You\u2019re probably thinking, \u201cGee, if the Scripting Guys take over Yahoo! they\u2019ll be rich and powerful. When that happens they aren\u2019t going to want to spend their time writing about system administration scripting.\u201d Well you know what? You\u2019re absolutely right about that; we\u2019ll be on the beach in Tahiti before the ink dries on the contract. But seeing as how we don\u2019t actually own Yahoo! (at least not yet) we\u2019ll go ahead and answer JS\u2019 question:<\/p>\n

Const ForReading = 1\nConst ForWriting = 2\n\nSet objFSO = CreateObject(\"Scripting.FileSystemObject\")\nSet objFile = objFSO.OpenTextFile(\"C:\\Scripts\\Test.txt\", ForReading)\n\nDo Until objFile.AtEndOfStream\n    strLine1 = objFile.ReadLine\n    If InStr(strLine1, \"Medical\") Then\n        strDuplicateLine = strLine1\n        strDuplicateLine = Replace(strDuplicateLine, \"Medical\", \"Dental\")\n   End If\n    strLine2 = objFile.ReadLine\n    strLine3 = objFile.ReadLine\n    strText = strText & strLine1 & vbCrLf & strLine2 & vbCrLf & strLine3 & vbCrLf\n    \n    If strDuplicateLine <> \"\" Then\n        strText = strText & strDuplicateLine & vbCrLf & strLine2 & vbCrLf & strLine3 & vbCrLf\n    End If\n\n    strDuplicateLine = \"\"\nLoop\n\nobjFile.Close\n\nSet objFile = objFSO.OpenTextFile(\"C:\\Scripts\\Test.txt\", ForWriting)\nobjFile.Write strText\nobjFile.Close\n<\/pre>\n
Before we launch into a discussion of how this script works, let\u2019s take a peek at the text we\u2019re working with. JS has a text file that looks a little something like this:<\/p>\n
Ken Myer, Medical, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12345\nPilar Ackerman, None, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12346\n<\/pre>\n
As you can see, every three lines in the file represent a record for a particular person: line 1 (which we\u2019ll get back to in a second) includes the person\u2019s name; line 2 includes a date; and line 3 includes a reference number. If line 1 also includes the word Medical<\/i> we want to duplicate this record, but with one exception: in the duplicate record we want to substitute the word Dental<\/i> for the word Medical<\/i>. In other words, if our script does what it\u2019s supposed to do then Ken Myer should end up with the following two records:<\/p>\n
Ken Myer, Medical, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12345\nKen Myer, Dental, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12345\n<\/pre>\n
See how that works? And what happens to Pilar Ackerman? Nothing. Because her record does not<\/i> contain the word Medical<\/i> her information remains exactly as-is:<\/p>\n
Pilar Ackerman, None, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12346\n<\/pre>\n
Got all that? Good. Now let\u2019s see if we can figure out how to get our script to accomplish this task.<\/p>\n
To begin with, we define a pair of constants \u2013 ForReading and ForWriting \u2013 that we\u2019ll need when we open the text file. Speaking of which, that\u2019s the very next thing we do: we use these two lines of code to create an instance of the Scripting.FileSystemObject<\/b> and open the file C:\\Scripts\\Test.txt for reading:<\/p>\n
Set objFSO = CreateObject(\"Scripting.FileSystemObject\")\nSet objFile = objFSO.OpenTextFile(\"C:\\Scripts\\Test.txt\", ForReading)\n<\/pre>\n
Once the text file is open we need to start examining the contents of that file line-by-line. To that end, we set up a Do Until loop designed to run until we\u2019ve read every line in the file (or, to be a bit more technical, to run until the file\u2019s AtEndOfStream<\/b> property is True):<\/p>\n
Do Until objFile.AtEndOfStream\n<\/pre>\n
Inside the loop, the first thing we do is use the ReadLine<\/b> method to read the first line in the file and store it in a variable named strLine1:<\/p>\n
strLine1 = objFile.ReadLine\n<\/pre>\n
From there we use the InStr<\/b> function to determine whether or not the word Medical<\/i> appears anywhere in the value of strLine1:<\/p>\n
If InStr(strLine1, \"Medical\") Then\n<\/pre>\n
Now, what happens if the line doesn\u2019t<\/i> contain the word Medical<\/i>? To be honest, nothing happens; because we didn\u2019t find the word Medical<\/i> there\u2019s nothing special we need to do with this record. But it\u2019s a different story if we do<\/i> find the word Medical<\/i>. In that case, we\u2019re going to run these two lines of code:<\/p>\n
strDuplicateLine = strLine1\n        strDuplicateLine = Replace(strDuplicateLine, \"Medical\", \"Dental\")\n<\/pre>\n
What are we doing here? Well, as you can see, we\u2019re really not doing all that much. In line 1 we assign the value of strLine1 to a variable named strDuplicateLine; in effect, we\u2019re making a virtual copy of the first line in the text file. In line 2 we take the variable strDuplicateLine and replace the word Medical<\/i> with the word Dental<\/i>. Once we\u2019ve done that the variable strLine will be equal to this:<\/p>\n
Ken Myer, Medical, 1\/1\/1980\n<\/pre>\n
Meanwhile, the variable strDuplicateLine will be equal to this:<\/p>\n
Ken Myer, Dental, 1\/1\/1980\n<\/pre>\n
And yes, that is<\/i> good: we now have the first line for Ken Myer\u2019s Medical record and<\/i> the first line for his Dental record.<\/p>\n
That brings us to these two lines of code:<\/p>\n
strLine2 = objFile.ReadLine\nstrLine3 = objFile.ReadLine\n<\/pre>\n
Both of these lines of code should be self-explanatory: in line 1 we use the ReadLine method to read the next line in the text file, and in line 2 we use the same method to read the line after that (the third line in the text file). The net result? The variable strLine2 will be equal to this:<\/p>\n
date, 1\/1\/2000\n<\/pre>\n
And the variable strLine3 will be equal to \u2013 well, that\u2019s right, line 3 in the text file:<\/p>\n
reference, 12345\n<\/pre>\n\n<\/thead>\n\n\n
\n
Note<\/b>. So did you really know that, or was that just a lucky guess? <\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n
<\/div>\n
We now have all the information we need to construct both records for Ken Myer. (Or to simply reconstruct his one record, if it turns out that we didn\u2019t find the word Medical<\/i>.) We can put together record 1 by using the following line of code:<\/p>\n
strText = strText & strLine1 & vbCrLf & strLine2 & vbCrLf & strLine3 & vbCrLf\n<\/pre>\n
Here we\u2019re assigning a new value to the variable strText. That value will consist of the existing value of strText plus the following items:<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n
\u2022<\/td>\n\n
The value of strLine1 (Ken Myer, Medical, 1\/1\/1980), and a carriage return-linefeed (the VBScript constant vbCrLf<\/b>).<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u2022<\/td>\n\n
The value of strLine2 (date, 1\/1\/2000) plus another carriage return-linefeed.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u2022<\/td>\n\n
The value of strLine3 (reference, 12345) plus one last carriage return-linefeed.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n
In other words, strText will be equal to this:<\/p>\n
Ken Myer, Medical, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12345\n<\/pre>\n
Next we check to see if the variable strDuplicateLine has a value (that is, the value is not<\/i> equal to an empty string):<\/p>\n
If strDuplicateLine <> \"\" Then\n<\/pre>\n
If strDuplicateLine has a value that can mean only one thing: we found the word Medical<\/i> in line 1 of this record, so we need to tack on the Dental<\/i> record as well. That\u2019s what this line of code is for:<\/p>\n
strText = strText & strDuplicateLine & vbCrLf & strLine2 & vbCrLf & strLine3 & vbCrLf\n<\/pre>\n
See? In this case we use the variable strDuplicateLine, the variable in which we replaced the word Medical<\/i> with the word Dental<\/i>. That makes strText equal to this:<\/p>\n
Ken Myer, Medical, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12345\nKen Myer, Dental, 1\/1\/1980\ndate, 1\/1\/2000\nreference, 12345\n<\/pre>\n
Well, what do you know? Ken Myer now has two records \u2013 one Medical and one Dental \u2013 just like we wanted him to have.<\/p>\n
Once that\u2019s done we reset the value of strDuplicateLine to an empty string, then zip back to the top of the loop to repeat the process with the next line in the text file. (Which, if you recall, will actually be line 4<\/i> in the text file; that\u2019s because we\u2019ve already read lines 1, 2, and 3.) As soon as we finish reading the entire file we use the Close<\/b> method to close Test.txt, then use this line of code to reopen the file, this time for writing:<\/p>\n
Set objFile = objFSO.OpenTextFile(\"C:\\Scripts\\Test.txt\", ForWriting)\n<\/pre>\n
From there we use the Write<\/b> method to replace the existing contents of the file with the value of the variable strText, close the file one last time, and then call it a day.<\/p>\n
As for the Yahoo! deal, we have to admit that we\u2019re beginning to have second thoughts. As it turns out, we underestimated the number of people who own Yahoo! stock; Yahoo! actually has hundreds of thousands of shareholders rather than the 5 or 6 we assumed they had. What does that mean? That means that we don\u2019t actually have enough bobbleheads to go around. If you guys are willing to share, well, that would be great. Otherwise, what about this: what do you think about Yahoo! buying<\/i> the Script Center? After all, what a great way to get back at Microsoft for making such a paltry offer for your company, eh? And just think about that for a moment: stealing Microsoft\u2019s crown jewel \u2013 the Script Center \u2013 away from them? Priceless.<\/p>\n
Well, not actually priceless<\/i>, mind you; however, the Scripting Guys are<\/i> willing to accept $42 billion for the Script Center. (Sure, the Script Center is probably worth more, but we\u2019re not greedy.) In fact, we\u2019ll even sweeten the deal a little: act before the end of the month, and we\u2019ll give you a 5% discount on top of everything else. Just let us know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hey, Scripting Guy! I need a script that can read a file and, based on the contents, insert some additional lines of text into that file. Can you help me with that?— JS Hey, JS. We\u2019re sure that most of you have heard by now that Microsoft has made an offer to buy Yahoo!, an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":595,"featured_media":87096,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3,4,14,5],"class_list":["post-55813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-scripting","tag-scripting-guy","tag-scripting-techniques","tag-text-files","tag-vbscript"],"acf":[],"blog_post_summary":"
Hey, Scripting Guy! I need a script that can read a file and, based on the contents, insert some additional lines of text into that file. Can you help me with that?— JS Hey, JS. We\u2019re sure that most of you have heard by now that Microsoft has made an offer to buy Yahoo!, an […]<\/p>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/595"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55813\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}