Re: create variable with calculated number of spaces.

[Ray Andrews <rayandrews@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 2024-05-06 22:52, Roman Perepelitsa wrote:

> You don't need to "cobble together complicated variables" here. Just
> printf straight away to stdout.
>     
    I know, I  mean in other situations where the variable really is
    complicated.  I've seen 'printf  -v' offered previously to do some
    pretty fancy stuff.  
    
>     % n=10
>     % y=${(r:n:: :)}  # n spaces
>     % x='hello'
>     % z=${(r:n:: :)x}  # right-justified x
>     
    Jim Murphy offered:
    
            spacer=${(l:diff:::: :)}
    
    ... very much in the same school of thought.  Feels more 'direct',
    if that means anything.  Mark suggests I shouldn't worry so much
    about 'economy' -- I tend to not want to use an elephant's worth of
    functionality ( printf ) where a mouses worth will do.  But maybe
    that's not a valid way to think cuz I can't really anticipate how
    the shell will actually get the work done.