Format output in columns

Question

I was wondering how to format the following output:

-0.3116274D-04
-0.2389361D-04
-0.1192458D-04
0.3306203D-04
0.2534987D-04
0.1265136D-04
-0.2167920D-04
-0.         


        

Answer 1

Wow, haven't seen this in a while. There are several ways:

The ol' pr command was used for this type of work -- especially if you wanted those columns going vertically instead of horizontally.

However, I would use printf which allows me to keep the text a constant width, and then use a counter and the modulo operator to count when I have five items in a line. The modulo operator is sometimes called a remainder operator. However, it functions like a clock:

#!/bin/bash
# 

count=0
while read number
do
    ((count+=1))
    printf "%14.14s  " $number
    if ((count % 5 == 0))
    then
        printf "\n"
    fi
done < $file
printf "\n"

The format for the printf is missing the minus ( i.e. %-14.14s) which forces the text to be aligned to the right instead of the left. That way the minus doesn't throw me off.