String Formatting in Business Logic Editor

[Former Member]

I need to left justify a variable length character string (10-15 characters) in a property that will be 20 characters wide. In C, I would use the sprintf format string "%-20s". Is there a comperable format code in xMII?

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi, David.

There's not a built-in function for this, but here's a trick I use.

1) Create a Global property called "Spaces", of type "String". Type in about 80 spaces into the dialog.

2) Anywhere you need "padded strings", you can use an expression such as (assuming you have a string "XYZ" in a local property named "Thing":

To left justify:

Local.Thing & stringleft(Globals.Spaces,20-stringlength( Local.Thing))

To right justify:

stringleft(Globals.Spaces,20-stringlength( Local.Thing)) & Local.Thing

That's all it takes! Hopefully it should work well for you.

Best regards,

Rick

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Rick-

Great minds think alike. I had actually started on that prior to seeing your post. I did not think to make SPACES a global. I will make that revision.

Thanks

[Former Member]

Hi Dave,

Are you trying to format the an Output sting? If so, how are you displaying the data?