Python: Is there a way to pretty-print a list?

Question

My list produces the following output: (running Python 3.4)

('MSG1', 3030)
('MEMORYSPACE', 3039)
('NEWLINE', 3040)
('NEG48', 3041)

Is there any way to make all the numbers line up like a column? Thanks. My code is a simple print statement:

for element in data:
    print (element) 

Answer 1

You can justify according to the longest word:

longest = max([len(x[0]) for x in data])

for j in data:
    a = j[0].ljust(longest)
    b = str(j[1])
    print(' '.join([a, b]))

Here is the output:

MSG1        3030
MEMORYSPACE 3039
NEWLINE     3040
NEG48       3041

Answer 2

Have you tried format ?

max_len = max([len(x[0]) for x in data])

for element in data:
    print '{value0:{width0}} {value1}'.format(value0=element[0],
                                              width0=max_len,
                                              value1=element[1])

Sample output:

MSG1        3030
MEMORYSPACE 3039
NEWLINE     3040
NEG48       3041

---

You could also right-justify by adding > to the format specifier:

    ...
    print '{value0:>{width0}} {value1}'.format(
    ...

Produces:

       MSG1 3030
MEMORYSPACE 3039
    NEWLINE 3040
      NEG48 3041

Answer 3

You can use '\\t' :

for element in data:
    print str(element[0])+'\t'+str(element[1])

---

MSG1    3030
MEMORYSPACE 3039
NEWLINE 3040
NEG48   3041

Unfortunately, because your first elements are sometimes longer, try printing the number first:

for element in data:
    print str(element[1])+'\t'+str(element[0])

---

3030    MSG1
3039    MEMORYSPACE
3040    NEWLINE
3041    NEG48

Answer 4

You could try the below. Since the second element is an integer value, you need to convert it into string type before printing.

>>> for x,y in data:
        print(x+"\t"+str(y))


MSG1    3030
MEMORYSPACE 3039

Answer 5

I would print the number first, if possible:

for i in lst:
    print i[1],'\t',i[0]