NAME

hetch - grab parameter from input history file


SYNOPSIS

  int hetch(name, format, variable)


INPUT PARAMETERS

name - char*
      parameter name
format - char*
      format of variable (d,f,s)


OUTPUT PARAMETERS

variable -void *
      value of variable


RETURN VALUE

x = number of matches found


DESCRIPTION

This function is a seplib extension of the older getpar() that extracts values from input history file expressions of the form `name=value'.


COMMENTS

More than one name may be searched by separating the alternatives by blanks or commas. Possible format conversions are ``d'' (or ``i''), ``f'' (or ``r''), ``g'' and ``s'' for integer, floating point, double precision, and strings respectively. If no match is found, the variable is not altered.

Hetch returns a count of the number of matches it found. Also, the input history file is copied to the output history file the first time hetch (or fetch) is invoked.

Search and copy of the input history file can be supressed using the command line parameter `noheader=y' in which case hetch returns 0.


DIAGNOSTICS

Program execution is terminated when the command argument list cannot be found.


BUGS

It should be possible to limit the length of retrieved strings and to extract individual characters. The length of the input header is limited to 30,000 characters when piped into a program.


KEYWORDS

parameter input header


SEE ALSO

the fetch manpage, the getch manpage


LIBRARY

sep