Python - adding text to a file with a specific format

Question

I guys the textfiles have a certain structure, and I would like to insert my text exactly in this structure. For this I have to save a number of character (placeholder) for certain columns and only after this number should I continue writing. Its hard to explain.

Answer 1

You can use string formatting for this.

row = " -  {:<13} {:<10} {:<10} {:-<1} {:-<1} {:-<1}".format(version, date, id_, marker[0], marker[1], marker[2])
file.write(row)

See here for examples on string formatting with padding.

What i used here:

• Placeholders are encapsulated with {}
• The colon : separates the paceholder name (not used here) and the formatting
• The < says text should be left-aligned
• The number after the < says how much space should be used at minimum for each word
• The - between the colon and the < is the fill character. Usually, this is a space, but your A, B, C - columns have a - to indicate nothing, so if you were to insert an empty string, it would print a - instead.