Python Print help ...

[Andrew Gould]

On Thu, Oct 7, 2010 at 5:00 PM, Ben Duncan <bend at linux4ms.net> wrote:
> I am writing some python programs to do various reporting.
> Is there better ways to do headers and details line then something
> like:
>
> print "ID NO         NAME                  ADDRESS ....." (and so on)
>
> I would like to have  string in simply PUT in the line string where I wanted
> it to go:
>
> ie: (Psudeo Code)
>
> string.copy(PRINT_HEADING(1), "ID NO")
> string.copy(PRINT_HEADING(13), "NAME")
>
> Thanks ...
>
> --
> Ben Duncan - Business Network Solutions, Inc. 336 Elton Road  Jackson MS,
> 39212

You can find a way to do anything; but if you have to count the spaces
for each program, I don't think it's going to save you a lot of time.

If, however, the lengths of the fields are standard across reports (eg
the "Name" field is always 7 characters long), you may get good use
out of a dictionary.  (I have indented code and output with 5 spaces
below).

     hdr = {'id':'ID No  ', 'name':'Name   ','address':'Address     '}

     print hdr['id] + hdr[name'] + hdr['address']

would result in:
     'ID No  Name   Address     '

     print hdr['id] + hdr[address'] + hdr['name']
would result in:
     'ID No  Address     Name   '

FYI:  The print statement is replaced by the print() function in Python 3:
http://docs.python.org/release/3.0.1/whatsnew/3.0.html

Regards,

Andrew