So I have a problem I know can be solved with string formatting but I really don't know where to start. What I want to do is create a list that is padded so that there is n number of characters before a comma as in the list below.
1148,
39,
365,
6,
56524,
Cheers and thanks for your help :)
The most straight-forward way is to use the str.rjust() function. For example:
your_list = [1148, 39, 365, 6, 56524]
for element in your_list:
print(str(element).rjust(5))
And you get:
1148
39
365
6
56524
There are also str.center() and str.ljust() for string justification in other directions.
But you can also do it via formatting:
your_list = [1148, 39, 365, 6, 56524]
for element in your_list:
print("{:>5}".format(element))
len(str(largest_value))) and then use that number for str.rjust() when padding the first element. Don't worry about comas and such - use the built-in csv module to do your bidding when it comes to generating the actual CSV structure.See Format Specification Mini-Language.
You are looking for something like "{:5d},".format(i) where i is the integer to be printed with a width of 5.
For a variable width: "{:{}d},".format(i, width).
Assuming you know what n is you can do:
'{:>n}'.format(number)
So if you have a list of integers and wanted to format it as above you could do:
numbers = [1148, 39, 365, 6, 56524]
result = '\n'.join(('{:>5},'.format(x) for x in numbers))
