8.4 Invoking columns

This program was designed for the purpose of generating compact, columnized tables. It will read a list of text items from standard in or a specified input file and produce a columnized listing of all the non-blank lines. Leading white space on each line is preserved, but trailing white space is stripped. Methods of applying per-entry and per-line embellishments are provided. See the formatting and separation arguments below.

This program is used by AutoGen to help clean up and organize its output.

See `autogen/agen5/fsm.tpl' and the generated output `pseudo-fsm.h'.

This function was not implemented as an expression function because either it would have to be many expression functions, or a provision would have to be added to provide options to expression functions. Maybe not a bad idea, but it is not being implemented at the moment.

A side benefit is that you can use it outside of AutoGen to columnize input, a la the ls command.

This section was generated by AutoGen, the aginfo template and the option descriptions for the columns program. It documents the columns usage text and option meanings.

This software is released under the GNU General Public License.