hi,

I'm not sure the subject accurately describes my scenario, but here's what I'm trying to do...

I have two text files...

file 1 - "plants.csv" has a list with a REFERENCE number

tomatoes,831
peppers,266
squash,595
apples,338
basil,831
eggplant,595

...and so on...

file 2, "months.csv" contains the same reference number, with a description as well.

january,637
february,338
march,484
april,831
may,266
june,595
july,926

With a batch file, how can I make this happen...

New file name "PlantWhen.csv"

tomatoes,831,april
peppers,266,may
squash,595,june
apples,338,february
basil,831,april
eggplant,595,june

The plants and months thing are just an example, what I'm trying to do is a little more complicated, but this is a GOOD representation

thanks in advance...
That is normally don in Excel or a similar program.
Is there a special reason or using a batch file?
Tokens and nested loops. In the outer loop, for each line of plants.csv: split line into two tokens, call them A and B, the DELIMITER being a COMMA. (e.g. A=tomatoes B=831) then read each line of months.csv, again splitting the lines into 2 comma-separated tokens, we'll call them C and D (e.g. C=January D=637). Compare token D to token B and if the same write token A token B Token C as a line to PlantWhen.csv.


Geek-9pm, yeah I'd usually do this in excel or a spreadsheet, but I'm writing a script...the VALUES above don't really mean anything.

Salmon, thanks, I had my if statement in the wrong place, your narrative helped tremendously...here's what worked. one line.

for /F "tokens=1-2 delims=," %%A in (plants.csv) do for /F "tokens=1,2 delims=," %%H in (months.csv) do if %%B == %%I echo %%A,%%B,%%H>>PlantWhen.csv