Match Tickets in a File Filter

Menu: Filters  Match File

Filter Match Tickets in a File is similar to the Match Winning Numbers filter however it does not look for matching ticket in the winning numbers database but in a selected ticket file.

Invoking this filter from the menu will first bring up a standard window to browse a file you wish to compare with the package. The name of the selected file is then shown in the upper part of filter's window together with the count of tickets in the file. You can browse a different file by clicking button .

Option Tag matching tickets allows to use so called tagging mode when applying this filter. It means that the filter compares the first ticket in the package with tickets in selected file. When a match is encountered then the matching ticket in the file is tagged and will not compared with package tickets any more (as if the ticket was not part of the ticket file).
Then you can load the file into the package and use functions for tagged tickets to see the percentage of matching tickets. You must realize that for e.g. a 6/49 lottery one ticket represents 20 different combinations of three numbers. Therefore when the ticket is ignored after being tagged another 19 possible combinations of three numbers are excluded from filter's comparison. That's why the filter's results using the Tag matching tickets option will differ from the regular filter's usage.

Option Allow variable combination size is available only when a text-based file has been chosen for matching. When checked, this options says that each line of text in the matching file may contain different count of drawn numbers. For example when playing a 6/49 lottery the matching file may look like this:

2,3,5,7,11,35,44,46,49
14,22,32
9,5,11,33,21,14
12,15,18,12,19

Please note that lines may contain more than six numbers (the first line in the example above). In such a case the maximum match would be six numbers. Lines may also contain less than six numbers (the second line in the example), in this case the maximum match would be three numbers. Numbers on each line do not have to be in ascending order (the third line) and numbers at each line may even repeat (the fourth line in the example above). In this case the maximum match would be four numbers.
The field separator can be a comma ",", semicolon ";", space " ", tab char or colon ":". Lines starting with "#" char ignored (can be used for user comments).

Example: Generate 100 random tickets from the whole range of drawn numbers and save the package into a file named test1. Then generate all possible combinations of three numbers (Generator - Dummy numbers at positions 6,5,4) and save them into a file named all3. Then use filter Match Tickets in a File to compare the combinations of three numbers in the package with file test1 (Tag matched tickets option is on). Load the test1 file into the package to review the tagged ticket. Then use the Remove Tags function to cancel tagging.
Now repeat the steps above to compare file test1 in the package with file all3. Again review the results in the all3 file by loading it in the package. In both cases select Matching Tickets Leave when using the filter.

Note: It is possible to enter the minimum and maximum possible values for required match. For example entering Min 5 and Max 8 in the row Match in 3 the tickets are "removed from /left in" the package when matching in three numbers with at least 5 tickets but at most with 8 tickets from the chosen testing file. It is possible also to enter either the minimum or the maximum values only for required match.