String manipulations

[Lorn]

I'm trying to work on a dataset that has it's primary numbers saved as
floats in string format. I'd like to work with them as integers with an
implied decimal to the hundredth. The problem is that the current
precision is variable. For instance, some numbers have 4 decimal places
while others have 2, etc. (10.7435 vs 1074.35)... all numbers are of
fixed length.

I have some ideas of how to do this, but I'm wondering if there's a
better way. My current way is to brute force search where the decimal
is by slicing and then cutoff the extraneous numbers, however, it would
be nice to stay away from a bunch of if then's.

Does anyone have any ideas on how to do this more efficiently?

Many Thanks,
Lorn