Python autoformat string containing strings of fixed length

Question

Let's say I have an arbitrary number of strings of the same length, e.g.:

'01'
'02'
'03'

And I need to format them into "one line grid" (separated with spaces) with fixed length. So, I'd like to do something like this:

>>'{some expression, 15, left}'.format(['01','02','03'])
'01 02 03       '

>>'{some expression, 15, right}'.format(['01','02','03'])
'       01 02 03'

Is it possible to do it like this just with format or in some other elegant way?

I want to use Python 3.

How are the arbitrary strings read, from a file or you already have a reference/variable? — Moses Koledoye
– Moses Koledoye, Commented Jun 22, 2016 at 9:16

Ic3fr0g · Accepted Answer · 2016-06-22 11:09:02Z

2

This is an apt solution to your problem that uses the inbuilt function format.

list = ['01','02','03']
list1=' '.join(list)
list_right='{:>15}'.format(list1)   #right 
list_left='{:<15}'.format(list1)    #left
print (list_right)

Here, < forces the field to be left-aligned within the available space (this is the default for most objects) while, > forces the field to be right-aligned within the available space (this is the default for numbers).

edited Jun 22, 2016 at 11:09

Ic3fr0g

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answered Jun 22, 2016 at 9:09

khelili miliana

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2 Comments

Eenoku Over a year ago

Thank you! Could you just correct the last print (I've specified python3, where print needs braces ), comments to Python format (to make it possible just to copy and launch the code) and separate the values just with space instead of a dash? I understand the code, but I think these changes will make it more useful for beginners, because it will fit completely to my question.

khelili miliana Over a year ago

Corrected, Thank you!

Ic3fr0g · Accepted Answer · 2016-06-22 09:56:04Z

1

This solution employs a lambda function and is more flexible -

list123 = ['01','02','03']
x=15                                     #limiting factor for str length
s123 = ' '.join(list123)                 #list elements become a str seperated by a space
s_space= lambda x:(x-len(s123))*' '      #store x-len(s123) spaces
s_left=s_space(x) +s123
s_right=s123 + s_space(x)
print(s_left)

Output : ' 01 02 03'

answered Jun 22, 2016 at 9:56

Ic3fr0g

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