FUNCTION dustem_read_chrg,file,silent=silent
  
;CAUTION: the data is read as strings ...

st=''
Nmax=10000L
sts=strarr(Nmax)
openr,unit,file,/get_lun
  
;==read comments
str=''
comments=['']
first_char='#'
Ncomments=0L
WHILE first_char EQ '#' DO BEGIN
  readf,unit,str
  first_char=strmid(str,0,1)
  comments=[comments,str]
  IF first_char EQ '#' THEN Ncomments=Ncomments+1
ENDWHILE

comments=comments[1:*]
IF Ncomments NE 0 THEN comments=comments[0:Ncomments-1]

;stop

;==read data
;last line in previous WHILE loop is first data
tmp = [str]
WHILE NOT EOF(unit) DO BEGIN
  readf, unit, str
  tmp = [tmp, str]
ENDWHILE
;==save and return structure
full_st={file:file,fchrg:tmp,comments:comments}
  
close,unit
free_lun,unit

RETURN,full_st
  
END