xmerge.py

A python script for merging data along x values.

For example, if you have two data files that look like this

------ File 1 ------   ------- File 2 -------
| x |  | y1 | | y2 |   | x |  | ya1 | | ya2 |
  1      1      2        1      3      2
  2      2      3        3      8
  4      3      5       

And you want output like this (so you can graph it, say)

----- Combined -------
| x | y1 | y2 | ya1 | ya2 |
  1   1    2    3     2
  2   2    3    0     0
  3   0    0    8     0
  4   3    5    0     0

You would use 

ianw@mingus:~/programs/xmerge$ cat 1.input
1,1,2
2,2,3
4,3,5
ianw@mingus:~/programs/xmerge$ cat 2.input
1,3,2
3,8
ianw@mingus:~/programs/xmerge$ ./xmerge.py 1.input 2.input  | sort -t 1
1,1,2,3,2
2,2,3,0,0
3,0,0,8,0
4,3,5,0,0

Easy!