new to format

emilford has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Okay, so I've finally gotten the format to work, but I need a little help getting the desired layout I want. Here is my current format:

format OUTPUT = 
@<<<<<<<<<<<    @<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
$word           $definition
.
[download]

Very simple, but it doesn't do exactly what I am looking to do. As you can probably tell, it's a simple word/definition output. The problem is that the definition is often longer than the allocated space and therefore gets truncated.

I'm looking for a way to get output that will continue the definition onto the next line. Sort of a multi-line definition (if needed) for each word.

word1             definition11111111111111111111111111111111
                  111111111111111111111
word2             definition22222222222222222222222222222222
                  222222222222222222222
[download]

Any suggestions? -Eric

Comment on new to format Select or Download Code

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Re: new to format by VSarkiss (Monsignor) on Apr 25, 2002 at 21:26 UTC
The key is the caret in the first line and the double-tilde in the second line as shown here: `format OUTPUT = @<<<<<<<<<<< ^<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< $word, $definition ~~ ^<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< $definition .` [download] More information at perlform. BTW, probably just a copy-and-paste thing, but you forgot the comma to separate the variables. I added it. HTH	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Re: new to format by emilford (Friar) on Apr 25, 2002 at 21:37 UTC
Damn, you monks are fast with the replies. Thanks for the info. About the comma, the code I have without the comma seems to work just fine. Is it necessary? -Eric	[reply]
Re (3): new to format by VSarkiss (Monsignor) on Apr 25, 2002 at 21:55 UTC
You should use the commas. If you use `-w`, it will tell you that omitting them is deprecated. And if you have expressions instead of simple variables, you'll very likely get a syntax error if you leave them out. You're welcome. If the advice was helpful, consider making a donation. ;-)	[reply] [d/l]