format stuff in columns

1 files changed, 33 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/tools/columns b/tools/columns
new file mode 100755
index 0000000..dcc934f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tools/columns
@@ -0,0 +1,33 @@
+#! /usr/bin/perl -w
+
+## not very scalable;  stores entire document in memory
+
+use strict;
+use List::Util qw[min max];
+
+main:{
+## leftmost column is column ZERO
+  my @cwid = ();        # width of column
+
+  my @store = ();
+
+  while (my $line = <>){
+    chomp $line;
+    my @stuff = split(' ', $line);
+    for (my $ii = 0; $ii < 0+@stuff; $ii++){
+      my $old = $cwid[$ii] || 0;
+      $cwid[$ii] = max(length($stuff[$ii]), $old);
+    }
+    push @store, \@stuff;
+  }
+  foreach my $line (@store) {
+    my @stuff = @$line;
+    for (my $ii = 0; $ii < 0+@stuff; $ii++){
+      if ($ii) {
+        print " ";
+      }
+      printf("\%-$cwid[$ii]s", $stuff[$ii]);
+    }
+    print "\n";
+  }
+}
\ No newline at end of file