SData — Statistical Data Interpreter

SData is a command interpreter for tabular data processing, inspired by Systat BASIC's data step model. It operates on a two-dimensional table of rows and columns, supporting floating point, integer, and character data types. Features include:

• CSV, ODF, and OOXML spreadsheet I/O
• Comprehensive statistical distribution functions (normal, t, F, chi-square, etc.)
• Aggregate functions (mean, median, standard deviation, etc.)
• Permanent and temporary variables, arrays (permanent, temporary, and virtual)
• Control flow (IF/THEN/ELSE, FOR/NEXT, WHILE, REPEAT/UNTIL, SELECT/CASE)
• BY-group processing
• SYSTEM/SHELL integration (can be disabled)

Build Requirements

SData is written in Ada 2012 and requires:

• GNAT — the GNU Ada compiler (part of GCC)
  • gcc-ada on openSUSE/SLES
  • gcc-gnat on Fedora/RHEL/Rocky/Alma/Mageia
  • gnat on Debian/Ubuntu
• GPRbuild — the GNAT project build tool
• GNU Make

Ada Library Dependencies

SData depends on three Ada libraries:

Library	Version	Purpose
Zip-Ada	61.0.0	ZIP/ODF archive handling
XML/Ada	26.0.0	XML parsing (ODF/OOXML)
MathPaqs	20260205.0.0	Numerical/random functions

If you use Alire, dependencies are resolved automatically. Otherwise, obtain the library source tarballs and place them in a sibling directory so that the Makefile can auto-detect them, or set GPR_PROJECT_PATH manually.

Building

make

This invokes gprbuild and produces the sdata executable in bin/.

To run the test suite:

make check

To install (default prefix /usr/local):

make install

Or specify a custom prefix:

make install PREFIX=/usr DESTDIR=/path/to/staging

Packaging

RPM (Fedora, openSUSE, RHEL, etc.)

Build a source RPM:

make srpm

This creates sdata-0.7.1-1.src.rpm which can be built with rpmbuild --rebuild or submitted to a build service. The vendored library tarballs must be present in ../Data/tarballs/.

Debian/Ubuntu

Build a Debian source package:

make dsc

This creates the .dsc, .orig.tar.gz, and .debian.tar.xz files. Build the binary package with dpkg-buildpackage or pbuilder.

Slackware

Create a SlackBuild tarball:

make slackware

This creates sdata-0.7.1-slackbuild.tar.gz containing the SlackBuild script, source tarball, and vendored dependencies. Extract and run ./sdata.SlackBuild as root to build the package.

macOS

Building with Alire

If you use Alire on macOS, the Alire-managed GNAT toolchain is a pre-built binary targeting a specific macOS SDK version. If your macOS version is older than the one the toolchain was compiled for, the C compiler will not find Apple's private SDK headers (such as _stdio.h) when compiling the bundled sqlite3.c in the ada_sqlite3 dependency, producing an error like:

fatal error: _stdio.h: No such file or directory

The fix is to set C_INCLUDE_PATH so that GCC can locate the SDK headers:

export SDKROOT=$(xcrun --show-sdk-path)
export C_INCLUDE_PATH=$SDKROOT/usr/include
alr build

Add both lines to your ~/.zshrc or ~/.zprofile to make the setting permanent. Note that SDKROOT alone is not sufficient — unlike Clang, the GCC-based GNAT toolchain does not automatically apply it as -isysroot.

This issue is not specific to Alire: the same fix is needed whenever the pre-built GNAT binary is used with gprbuild directly. A GNAT compiled natively for your macOS version will have the correct SDK paths embedded and should not require this workaround.

Running the Test Suite

The test harness uses the GNU coreutils timeout command, which is not included with macOS. Install it via MacPorts (sudo port install coreutils), after which it is available as gtimeout. The Makefile detects gtimeout automatically, so no further configuration is needed.

Installer Package

Build a macOS installer package:

make pkg

This creates sdata-0.7.1.pkg. The sdata binary must already be built (make first). Requires the pkgbuild tool (included with Xcode).

Windows

Building

The recommended toolchain is Alire inside an MSYS2 MinGW64 shell. Install Alire from the MSYS2 package or from the upstream release, then:

alr build

Or, equivalently:

alr exec -- make

The build produces bin\sdata.exe. Cygwin works too — Alire and a recent GNAT toolchain on PATH are the only hard requirements.

MSI Installer

Build a Windows MSI installer:

alr exec -- make msi

This creates sdata-0.7.1-x64.msi, a per-machine x64 installer that places sdata.exe, LICENSE.txt, README.md, and an HTML rendering of the man page under C:\Program Files\sdata\ and appends that directory to the system PATH. Requirements:

• WiX Toolset v4 or later (v7 recommended) via the .NET tool:

  dotnet tool install --global wix

  Verify with wix --version. WiX requires the .NET 8 (or later) SDK.

• pandoc — converts the man page to HTML for inclusion in the installer. In MSYS2: pacman -S mingw-w64-x86_64-pandoc. Alternately, Pandoc can be installed via Chocolatey or downloaded directly from the Pandoc website.

Install the resulting MSI with msiexec /i sdata-0.7.1-x64.msi, or by double-clicking it. After install, sdata is available from any new CMD or PowerShell window.

Release Management

The scripts/bump-version.sh script updates the version string in all nine tracked locations atomically (source, Makefile, alire.toml, SlackBuild, man page, README, RPM spec, and Debian changelog), then optionally builds, tests, commits, and tags.

scripts/bump-version.sh <new-version> "<changelog-summary>"

For example:

scripts/bump-version.sh 0.7.1 "Add spreadsheet formula evaluation and multi-sheet support."

The script validates the N.N.N version format, detects the current version from src/sdata-config.ads, and warns if any old version strings remain after the update (expected in changelog history).

Quick Start

Interactive Mode

Run sdata with no arguments to enter the interactive console:

$ sdata
SData Statistical Interpreter version 0.7.1
Interactive Console. Type QUIT to exit.
sdata> use "mydata.csv"
sdata> print recno, name$, score
sdata> run
sdata> quit

Batch Mode

Write commands in a file and pass it as an argument:

sdata myscript.cmd

Command Line Options

sdata [options] [filename]

  -h, --help                Show help
  -v, --version             Show version
  -m <size>                 Max in-memory table size
  -t <count>                Max temporary variables
  --clen <len>              Max character variable length
  --noshell                 Disable SHELL/SYSTEM commands; also disables -p
  -k, --continue-on-error   Continue after statement errors
  --ignore-math-errors      Math errors return missing instead of halting
  -p <pager>                External pager command for interactive output (ignored in batch mode)
  -o <file>                 Console output file
  -q                        Quiet mode (suppress console output)

Getting Help

From the interactive console or in a script:

HELP              — List all commands and functions
HELP <command>    — Detailed help for a specific command or function
HELP /ALL         — Full reference for all commands and functions

License

GPL-3.0. See LICENSE for the full text.

Author

John L. Ries john@theyarnbard.com