Printf - Columns/Tables
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From: Sidney Lambe on 27 Mar 2010 22:28 I've learned how to make nice neat colums/tables with printf. var1="gem" var2="frenchbread" var3="z" printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 gem fre z var1="pp" var2="all" var3="jamboree" printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 pp all jam var1="toe" var2="lettuce" var3="rock" printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 toe let roc gem fre z pp all jam toe let roc So how do I position that entire table precisely? I can mickey mouse it with with something like this: printf " %-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 But it seems to me that there must be a way to make the line: "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" a sub-expression (?) and. say. right justify the whole line on the page as if the line was a single 'column' defined by something like "%-72.15". (I hope I am expressing that clearly.) I've tried a bunch of things with parenthesis and seen no results but a lot of error messages from printf. Lately, they've read: printf: --: invalid option printf: usage: printf format [arguments] printf: you are a dummy -- give it up Sid
From: Janis Papanagnou on 28 Mar 2010 07:11 Sidney Lambe wrote: > I've learned how to make nice neat colums/tables with printf. > > var1="gem" > var2="frenchbread" > var3="z" > printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > gem fre z > > var1="pp" > var2="all" > var3="jamboree" > printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > pp all jam > > var1="toe" > var2="lettuce" > var3="rock" > printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > toe let roc > > gem fre z > pp all jam > toe let roc > > So how do I position that entire table precisely? I can > mickey mouse it with with something like this: > > printf " %-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > > But it seems to me that there must be a way to make the line: > "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" a sub-expression (?) and. say. right > justify the whole line on the page as if the line was a > single 'column' defined by something like "%-72.15". > > (I hope I am expressing that clearly.) For the simple case I'd do indent=20 printf "%*s%s\t%s\n" "$indent" "" Arg1 Arg2 If you want to align it at the center of the screen with given width in variable COLUMNS you can do output=$( printf "%s %s" Arg1 Arg2 ) and use $COLUMNS to calculate and align the data in 'output' using a second printf printf "%*s%s\n" $(( ($COLUMNS - ${#output}) / 2 )) "" "$output" Janis > > I've tried a bunch of things with parenthesis and seen no > results but a lot of error messages from printf. Lately, > they've read: > > printf: --: invalid option > printf: usage: printf format [arguments] > printf: you are a dummy -- give it up > > Sid >
From: Ed Morton on 28 Mar 2010 11:03 On 3/27/2010 9:28 PM, Sidney Lambe wrote: > I've learned how to make nice neat colums/tables with printf. > > var1="gem" > var2="frenchbread" > var3="z" > printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > gem fre z > > var1="pp" > var2="all" > var3="jamboree" > printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > pp all jam > > var1="toe" > var2="lettuce" > var3="rock" > printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > toe let roc > > gem fre z > pp all jam > toe let roc > > So how do I position that entire table precisely? I can > mickey mouse it with with something like this: > > printf " %-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 > > But it seems to me that there must be a way to make the line: > "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" a sub-expression (?) and. say. right > justify the whole line on the page as if the line was a > single 'column' defined by something like "%-72.15". > > (I hope I am expressing that clearly.) > > I've tried a bunch of things with parenthesis and seen no > results but a lot of error messages from printf. Lately, > they've read: > > printf: --: invalid option > printf: usage: printf format [arguments] > printf: you are a dummy -- give it up > > Sid > Use a text processing tool like awk instead of shell: $ cat file gem frenchbread z pp all jamboree toe lettuce rock $ awk '{printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n",$1,$2,$3}' file gem fre z pp all jam toe let roc $ awk '{printf "%32.15s\n",sprintf("%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n",$1,$2,$3)}' file gem fre z pp all jam toe let roc $ awk -v var1="gem" -v var2="frenchbread" -v var3="z" ' BEGIN{printf "%32.15s\n",sprintf("%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n",var1,var2,var3); exit}' gem fre z Regards, Ed.
From: Sidney Lambe on 28 Mar 2010 15:42 On comp.unix.shell, Ed Morton <mortonspam(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On 3/27/2010 9:28 PM, Sidney Lambe wrote: >> I've learned how to make nice neat colums/tables with printf. >> >> var1="gem" >> var2="frenchbread" >> var3="z" >> printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >> gem fre z >> >> var1="pp" >> var2="all" >> var3="jamboree" >> printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >> pp all jam >> >> var1="toe" >> var2="lettuce" >> var3="rock" >> printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >> toe let roc >> >> gem fre z >> pp all jam >> toe let roc >> >> So how do I position that entire table precisely? I can >> mickey mouse it with with something like this: >> >> printf " %-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >> >> But it seems to me that there must be a way to make the line: >> "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" a sub-expression (?) and. say. right >> justify the whole line on the page as if the line was a >> single 'column' defined by something like "%-72.15". >> >> (I hope I am expressing that clearly.) >> >> I've tried a bunch of things with parenthesis and seen no >> results but a lot of error messages from printf. Lately, >> they've read: >> >> printf: --: invalid option >> printf: usage: printf format [arguments] >> printf: you are a dummy -- give it up >> >> Sid >> > > Use a text processing tool like awk instead of shell: > > $ cat file > gem frenchbread z > pp all jamboree > toe lettuce rock > > $ awk '{printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n",$1,$2,$3}' file > gem fre z > pp all jam > toe let roc > > $ awk '{printf "%32.15s\n",sprintf("%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n",$1,$2,$3)}' file > gem fre z > pp all jam > toe let roc > > $ awk -v var1="gem" -v var2="frenchbread" -v var3="z" ' > BEGIN{printf "%32.15s\n",sprintf("%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n",var1,var2,var3); exit}' > gem fre z > > Regards, > > Ed. An awk is a dumb bird. I'll bet an awk would answer a printf question with an awk solution. You are an awk fanatic, Ed. Your responses to questions about text formatting are not to be trusted. Tunnel vision is awk(ward). I prefer sed to awk, as you well know. If you don't like it you can go eat some awk doo. Sid
From: Janis Papanagnou on 28 Mar 2010 14:55
Sidney Lambe wrote: > On comp.unix.shell, Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanagnou(a)hotmail.com> wrote: >> Sidney Lambe wrote: >>> I've learned how to make nice neat colums/tables with printf. >>> >>> var1="gem" >>> var2="frenchbread" >>> var3="z" >>> printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >>> gem fre z >>> >>> var1="pp" >>> var2="all" >>> var3="jamboree" >>> printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >>> pp all jam >>> >>> var1="toe" >>> var2="lettuce" >>> var3="rock" >>> printf "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >>> toe let roc >>> >>> gem fre z >>> pp all jam >>> toe let roc >>> >>> So how do I position that entire table precisely? I can >>> mickey mouse it with with something like this: >>> >>> printf " %-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" $var1 $var2 $var3 >>> >>> But it seems to me that there must be a way to make the line: >>> "%-5.3s%-5.3s%-5.3s\n" a sub-expression (?) and. say. right >>> justify the whole line on the page as if the line was a >>> single 'column' defined by something like "%-72.15". >>> >>> (I hope I am expressing that clearly.) >> For the simple case I'd do >> >> indent=20 >> printf "%*s%s\t%s\n" "$indent" "" Arg1 Arg2 >> >> If you want to align it at the center of the screen with given width >> in variable COLUMNS you can do >> >> output=$( printf "%s %s" Arg1 Arg2 ) >> >> and use $COLUMNS to calculate and align the data in 'output' using a >> second printf >> >> printf "%*s%s\n" $(( ($COLUMNS - ${#output}) / 2 )) "" "$output" >> >> >> Janis >> > > Thanks, Janis. That really put me through my paces. I had > to find an online C Reference Manual to figure out what > that "*" meant. And I'm still not clear about the "". Is > that a 'null string'? Yes, it is. Just an (invisible) argument to satisfy the %*s. You could as well output a blank " " instead. It's not immediately clear that %*s requires two arguments; the first to replace the * by a number, and the second is the actual argument to be displayed. Since what we want here is just a (kind of invisible) padding I've choosen an empty string "". > > The documentation for bash builtin printf and /bin/printf in > linux are pathetic. The manpage says to see the info manual 'info' pages?! - *shudder* Janis > for the full documentation, but there isn't an info manual for > printf. I checked at gnu.org and even used google to search the > entire sit. > > Sid > |