#! perl -slw
use strict;

sub log10{ log( $_[0] ) / log( 10 ) }

sub tape {
    my( $start, $end ) = @_;
    my $n = log10( $end );
    my @lines = split '', $start;
    for my $p ( $start + 1 .. $end -1 ) {
        for my $l ( 0 .. $n ) {
            $lines[ $n - $l ] .= 
                $p % 10**$l ? ' ' : substr int( $p / 10**$l ), -1;
        }
    }
    $lines[ $_ ] .= substr $end, $_, 1 for 0 .. length( $end ) -1;
    unshift @lines, '-' x ( $end - $start + 1 );
    push    @lines, '-' x ( $end - $start );
    substr $lines[ -1 ], ( $end - $start ) / 2, 0, 'v';
    return @lines;
}

print for tape( 170, 230 );

print for tape( 1970, 2030 );

print for tape( 39_999_963, 40_000_041 );

__END__
c:\test>712774.pl
-------------------------------------------------------------
1                             2                             2
7         8         9         0         1         2         3
0123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890
------------------------------v------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------
1                             2                             2
9                             0                             0
7         8         9         0         1         2         3
0123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890
------------------------------v------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3                                    4                                        4
9                                    0                                        0
9                                    0                                        0
9                                    0                                        0
9                                    0                                        0
9                                    0                                        0
6      7         8         9         0         1         2         3         44
3456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901
---------------------------------------v---------------------------------------