in reply to Question about oddities when printing a tab

not reproducible on my system.

please check if that code produces that output:

lanx@nc10-ubuntu:~$ perl
my @systems=qw(SERVER1 SERVER2 SERVER3);
foreach my $system (@systems) {
    print "Now powering on $system:";
    print "\t\t[DONE]\n";
}
__END__
Now powering on SERVER1:        [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER2:        [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER3:        [DONE]
lanx@nc10-ubuntu:~$

[download]

Otherwise try to isolate the bug, eg dump \@systems and check special vars.

Cheers Rolf

UPDATE:

If you click on the download link of my code you will see that my example has real tabs where yours has a list of blanks. Your not posting the real output.

UPDATE:

do your servernames really have the same length? 

lanx@nc10-ubuntu:~$ perl
my @systems=qw(SRV1 SERVER2 SERVER3);
foreach my $system (@systems) {
    print "Now powering on $system:";
    print "\t\t[DONE]\n";
}
__END__
Now powering on SRV1:        [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER2:        [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER3:        [DONE]

[download]

if not better try using printf or formats

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re^2: Question about oddities when printing a tab
by walkingthecow (Friar) on Jan 04, 2013 at 06:15 UTC

    That is my code exactly, minus shebang and use strict/warnings. I just did that simple bit of code to see if I could reproduce the issue, and it did.

    Actually, just tested your code and output was as expected. I had done it earlier without Term::ANSIColor and they were not aligned, but now they are. Adding Term::ANSIColor back in and the output is out of line again. So it does seem to have something to do with Term::ANSIColor, now I just need to figure out what.

    Thanks for your help!

    My Code: 
    #!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
use Term::ANSIColor;

my @systems=qw(SERVER1 SERVER2 SERVER3);
foreach my $system (@systems) {
    print "Now powering on $system:";
    print color 'bold red';
    print " \t\t[DONE]\n";
    print color 'reset';
}
_END_
Now powering on SERVER1:          [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER2:               [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER3:               [DONE]

    [download]

    By the way, I am posting my output by copying/pasting from terminal window. Is that the wrong way to do it?

    UPDATE

    Changed my code as follows and now output is as expected. Sorry for such a stupid question...

    #!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
use Term::ANSIColor;

my @systems=qw(SERVER1 SERVER2 SERVER3);
foreach my $system (@systems) {
    print "Now powering on $system:";
    print "\t\t".colored("[DONE]", 'bold red')."\n";
}

    [download]
[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
      > By the way, I am posting my output by copying/pasting from terminal window. Is that the wrong way to do it?

      no thats what I'm doing, and it works on my linux box. but now it's evident that Term::ANSIColor tries to translate tabs to blanks.

      lanx@nc10-ubuntu:~$ perl
use strict;
use warnings;
use Term::ANSIColor;
 
my @systems=qw(SERVER1 SERVER2 SERVER3);
foreach my $system (@systems) {
    print "Now powering on $system:";
    print color 'bold red';
    print " \t\t[DONE]\n";
    print color 'reset';
}
__END__
Now powering on SERVER1:         [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER2:         [DONE]
Now powering on SERVER3:         [DONE]
                         ^blanks^

      [download]

      Seems like in your environment the translation is broken.

      Your solution works now, because you transfered the tabs out of colored().

      Anyway this only works reliably as long as your "server" names all have the same length. Do you really have less than 10? ;-)

      Cheers Rolf

[reply]
[d/l]
        The server names actually do all have the same length, though there are far more than 10. However, the naming convention is not SERVERX, I just used that for my example ;)

        My environment is Solaris 9 with Perl 5.8, so that may be part of the issue as well. But, everything is working now. I appreciate your help!

[reply]

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