4.4. Data from Text Files

EspressChart also allows you to retrieve data from flat text files. To add a text file as a data source, select the TXTFiles node in the Data Source Manager and click the Add button. A dialog will open prompting you to specify a display name and the location of the text file you want to use.

Add Text Data Source Dialog

	Tip
	The text file can be also retrieved from URL. To do so, enter the URL to the File text field. You have to enter a full URL with protocol etc. (e.g. `http://www.quadbase.com/textfile.txt`).

After you specify the information, click the OK button and the text source will appear under the TXTFiles node of the Data Source Manager window.

4.4.1. Formatting Requirements for Text Files

There are certain formatting requirements for the data within a text file in order make it readable by EspressChart. Generally, data is expected to be in a form similar to the following:

String,date,decimal
Name,day,Volume
"John","1997-10-3",32.3
"John","1997-4-3",20.2
"Mary","1997-9-3",10.2
"Mary","1997-10-04",18.6

The above data file is a plain text file. The first row specifies the data types and the second row specifies the field names. The third row and so on are the records. Every text file must consist of these three parts. There are four records, with three fields each in the example data file. The delimiter between the fields may be one of the following characters: ",", ";", or " " (that is comma, semi-colon, or space). Each field can be put in quotes (single or double).

4.4.2. Data Types and Format for Text Files

In text data files, the data type is specified using a keyword. The following is a list of recognized keywords and their corresponding JDBC type and Java type.

Data File Keywords (Not Case Sensitive)	JDBC Type	Java Type in EspressChart
Boolean, logical, bit	BIT	Boolean
tinyint	TINYINT	byte
smallint, short	SMALLINT	short
int, integer	INTEGER	int
long, bigint	BIGINT	long
float	FLOAT	double
real	REAL	float
double	DOUBLE	double
numeric	NUMERIC	java.math.BigDecimal
decimal	DECIMAL	java.math.BigDecimal
date	DATE	java.sql.Date
time	TIME	java.sql.Time
timestamp	TIMESTAMP	java.sql.Timestamp
string	CHAR	String
varchar	VARCHAR	String
longvarchar	LONGVARCHAR	String

For certain data types, the data in a text file must be presented in a specific format. The following is a list of the data types that require specific formatting:

Data Type	Format	Example
Date	yyyy-mm-dd or yyyy-mm	2001-06-12 or 2000-06
Time	hh:mm:ss	12:17:34
Timestamp	yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm:ss	2001-06-12 12:17:34
Boolean	true/false, t/f, 1/0 (case insensitive)	true

There is a sample text file included in the EspressChart installation. The file is located in help/examples/DataSources/text directory of your installation and is called Sample.dat.