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Contents

• Installation
• Examples
• API
  • Txtble
  • Configuration Options
  • BorderStyle
  • Other

txtble is yet another Python library for creating plain-text tables. (All the good names were taken, OK?) Pass in a list of lists of strings (or other stringable things) and get out something nice like:

+---------+----------+------------------+
|Month    |Birthstone|Birth Flower      |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|January  |Garnet    |Carnation         |
|February |Amethyst  |Violet            |
|March    |Aquamarine|Jonquil           |
|April    |Diamond   |Sweetpea          |
|May      |Emerald   |Lily Of The Valley|
|June     |Pearl     |Rose              |
|July     |Ruby      |Larkspur          |
|August   |Peridot   |Gladiolus         |
|September|Sapphire  |Aster             |
|October  |Opal      |Calendula         |
|November |Topaz     |Chrysanthemum     |
|December |Turquoise |Narcissus         |
+---------+----------+------------------+

Features:

• Rows can be passed as lists or dicts
• ANSI color aware
• Unicode fullwidth & combining character aware
• Control the horizontal (left, center, & right) and vertical (top, middle, & bottom) alignment of text
• Align numbers along their decimal points
• Customize characters used for drawing borders
• Toggle inter-row, inter-column, and outer borders
• Set the value used to fill out ragged rows
• Pad cells on the left & right
• Set column widths, with long lines wrapped to fit
• Configure how None values are displayed
• Type annotations

Installation

txtble requires Python 3.8 or higher. Just use pip for Python 3 (You have pip, right?) to install txtble and its dependencies:

python3 -m pip install txtble

Examples

Construct & show a basic table:

>>> from txtble import Txtble
>>> # Taken from /usr/share/misc/birthtoken.gz in Ubuntu Xenial's miscfiles package:
>>> HEADERS = ['Month', 'Birthstone', 'Birth Flower']
>>> DATA = [
...     ['January',   'Garnet',     'Carnation'],
...     ['February',  'Amethyst',   'Violet'],
...     ['March',     'Aquamarine', 'Jonquil'],
...     ['April',     'Diamond',    'Sweetpea'],
...     ['May',       'Emerald',    'Lily Of The Valley'],
...     ['June',      'Pearl',      'Rose'],
...     ['July',      'Ruby',       'Larkspur'],
...     ['August',    'Peridot',    'Gladiolus'],
...     ['September', 'Sapphire',   'Aster'],
...     ['October',   'Opal',       'Calendula'],
...     ['November',  'Topaz',      'Chrysanthemum'],
...     ['December',  'Turquoise',  'Narcissus'],
... ]
>>> tbl = Txtble(DATA, headers=HEADERS)
>>> print(tbl)
+---------+----------+------------------+
|Month    |Birthstone|Birth Flower      |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|January  |Garnet    |Carnation         |
|February |Amethyst  |Violet            |
|March    |Aquamarine|Jonquil           |
|April    |Diamond   |Sweetpea          |
|May      |Emerald   |Lily Of The Valley|
|June     |Pearl     |Rose              |
|July     |Ruby      |Larkspur          |
|August   |Peridot   |Gladiolus         |
|September|Sapphire  |Aster             |
|October  |Opal      |Calendula         |
|November |Topaz     |Chrysanthemum     |
|December |Turquoise |Narcissus         |
+---------+----------+------------------+

The table can also be constructed like this:

>>> tbl = Txtble(headers=HEADERS)
>>> tbl.extend(DATA)

Or like this:

>>> tbl = Txtble(headers=HEADERS)
>>> for row in DATA:
...     tbl.append(row)

Or even like this:

>>> tbl = Txtble(DATA)
>>> tbl.headers = HEADERS

The rows of the table can be lists of values (as seen above) or dicts that map header names to values:

>>> tbl = Txtble(
...     headers = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"],
...     data    = [
...         {"Red": "Ruby", "Green": "Emerald", "Blue": "Sapphire"},
...         {"Red": "Fire", "Green": "Earth",   "Blue": "Water"},
...     ],
... )
>>> print(tbl)
+----+-------+--------+
|Red |Green  |Blue    |
+----+-------+--------+
|Ruby|Emerald|Sapphire|
|Fire|Earth  |Water   |
+----+-------+--------+

Missing dict keys can be filled in with the dict_fill option (Without it, you'd get a KeyError here):

>>> tbl = Txtble(
...     headers = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"],
...     data    = [
...         {"Red": "Ruby", "Green": "Emerald", "Blue": "Sapphire"},
...         {"Red": "Fire", "Green": "Earth",   "Blue": "Water"},
...         {"Red": "Hot",                      "Blue": "Cold"},
...     ],
...     dict_fill = 'UNKNOWN',
... )
>>> print(tbl)
+----+-------+--------+
|Red |Green  |Blue    |
+----+-------+--------+
|Ruby|Emerald|Sapphire|
|Fire|Earth  |Water   |
|Hot |UNKNOWN|Cold    |
+----+-------+--------+

The number of columns is automatically set to the length of the longest row:

>>> tbl = Txtble([
...     ['1', '1'],
...     ['Z_6', '1', 'x', 'x^2', 'x^3', 'x^4', 'x^5'],
...     ['S_3', '1', 'a', 'b', 'aba', 'ba', 'ab'],
...     ['Z_4', '1', 'x', 'x^2', 'x^3'],
...     ['V_4', '1', 'a', 'b', 'ab'],
... ])
>>> print(tbl)
+---+-+-+---+---+---+---+
|1  |1| |   |   |   |   |
|Z_6|1|x|x^2|x^3|x^4|x^5|
|S_3|1|a|b  |aba|ba |ab |
|Z_4|1|x|x^2|x^3|   |   |
|V_4|1|a|b  |ab |   |   |
+---+-+-+---+---+---+---+

... unless you've specified a header row, which puts a limit on the number of columns:

>>> tbl.headers = ['Group', 'Elements']
>>> print(tbl)
+-----+--------+
|Group|Elements|
+-----+--------+
|1    |1       |
|Z_6  |1       |
|S_3  |1       |
|Z_4  |1       |
|V_4  |1       |
+-----+--------+

... unless you've also specified a header_fill to use as the header for extra columns:

>>> tbl.header_fill = 'Extra!'
>>> print(tbl)
+-----+--------+------+------+------+------+------+
|Group|Elements|Extra!|Extra!|Extra!|Extra!|Extra!|
+-----+--------+------+------+------+------+------+
|1    |1       |      |      |      |      |      |
|Z_6  |1       |x     |x^2   |x^3   |x^4   |x^5   |
|S_3  |1       |a     |b     |aba   |ba    |ab    |
|Z_4  |1       |x     |x^2   |x^3   |      |      |
|V_4  |1       |a     |b     |ab    |      |      |
+-----+--------+------+------+------+------+------+

You can set the widths of columns; long lines will be wrapped to fit:

>>> tbl = Txtble(
...     headers=['Short Text', 'Long Text'],
...     data=[
...         [
...             'Hi there!',
...             'Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit',
...         ]
...     ],
...     widths=[20, 20],
... )
>>> print(tbl)
+--------------------+--------------------+
|Short Text          |Long Text           |
+--------------------+--------------------+
|Hi there!           |Lorem ipsum dolor   |
|                    |sit amet,           |
|                    |consectetur         |
|                    |adipisicing elit    |
+--------------------+--------------------+

You can align column text to the left, right, or center:

>>> tbl = Txtble(DATA, headers=HEADERS, align=['r', 'c', 'l'])
>>> print(tbl)
+---------+----------+------------------+
|    Month|Birthstone|Birth Flower      |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|  January|  Garnet  |Carnation         |
| February| Amethyst |Violet            |
|    March|Aquamarine|Jonquil           |
|    April| Diamond  |Sweetpea          |
|      May| Emerald  |Lily Of The Valley|
|     June|  Pearl   |Rose              |
|     July|   Ruby   |Larkspur          |
|   August| Peridot  |Gladiolus         |
|September| Sapphire |Aster             |
|  October|   Opal   |Calendula         |
| November|  Topaz   |Chrysanthemum     |
| December|Turquoise |Narcissus         |
+---------+----------+------------------+

Numbers in the same column can be aligned on their decimal point with the 'n' alignment:

>>> tbl = Txtble(
...     headers=['Thing', 'Value'],
...     data=[
...         ['Foo', 12345],
...         ['Bar', 1234.5],
...         ['Baz', 123.45],
...         ['Quux', 12.345],
...         ['Glarch', 1.2345],
...         ['Gnusto', .12345],
...     ],
...     align=['l', 'n'],
... )
>>> print(tbl)
+------+-----------+
|Thing |Value      |
+------+-----------+
|Foo   |12345      |
|Bar   | 1234.5    |
|Baz   |  123.45   |
|Quux  |   12.345  |
|Glarch|    1.2345 |
|Gnusto|    0.12345|
+------+-----------+

Unicode works too, even fullwidth characters and combining characters:

>>> tbl = Txtble(
...     headers=['Wide', 'Accented'],
...     data=[
...         [
...             u'\uFF37\uFF49\uFF44\uFF45',
...             u'A\u0301c\u0301c\u0301e\u0301n\u0301t\u0301e\u0301d\u0301',
...         ]
...     ]
... )
>>> print(tbl)
+--------+--------+
|Wide    |Accented|
+--------+--------+
|Ｗｉｄｅ|Áććéńt́éd́|
+--------+--------+

You can configure the borders and make them fancy:

>>> from txtble import ASCII_EQ_BORDERS
>>> tbl = Txtble(
...     DATA,
...     headers       = HEADERS,
...     header_border = ASCII_EQ_BORDERS,
...     row_border    = True,
... )
>>> print(tbl)
+---------+----------+------------------+
|Month    |Birthstone|Birth Flower      |
+=========+==========+==================+
|January  |Garnet    |Carnation         |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|February |Amethyst  |Violet            |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|March    |Aquamarine|Jonquil           |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|April    |Diamond   |Sweetpea          |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|May      |Emerald   |Lily Of The Valley|
+---------+----------+------------------+
|June     |Pearl     |Rose              |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|July     |Ruby      |Larkspur          |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|August   |Peridot   |Gladiolus         |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|September|Sapphire  |Aster             |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|October  |Opal      |Calendula         |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|November |Topaz     |Chrysanthemum     |
+---------+----------+------------------+
|December |Turquoise |Narcissus         |
+---------+----------+------------------+

... or very fancy:

>>> from txtble import DOUBLE_BORDERS
>>> tbl = Txtble(DATA, headers=HEADERS, border_style=DOUBLE_BORDERS)
>>> print(tbl)
╔═════════╦══════════╦══════════════════╗
║Month    ║Birthstone║Birth Flower      ║
╠═════════╬══════════╬══════════════════╣
║January  ║Garnet    ║Carnation         ║
║February ║Amethyst  ║Violet            ║
║March    ║Aquamarine║Jonquil           ║
║April    ║Diamond   ║Sweetpea          ║
║May      ║Emerald   ║Lily Of The Valley║
║June     ║Pearl     ║Rose              ║
║July     ║Ruby      ║Larkspur          ║
║August   ║Peridot   ║Gladiolus         ║
║September║Sapphire  ║Aster             ║
║October  ║Opal      ║Calendula         ║
║November ║Topaz     ║Chrysanthemum     ║
║December ║Turquoise ║Narcissus         ║
╚═════════╩══════════╩══════════════════╝

See the following documentation for more information:

API

Txtble

Txtble(data=(), **kwargs)

Create a new Txtble object. The table's data may be passed to the constructor as an iterable of rows of values, where each row is either an iterable of cell values or a mapping from header names to cell values; otherwise, the data starts out empty. In either case, further data rows can be added via the append() and extend() methods.

**kwargs are used to configure the Txtble instance; see "Configuration Options" below.

tbl.append(row)

Add a new data row at the bottom of the table. row can be either an iterable of cell values or a mapping from header names to cell values.

tbl.extend(rows)

Add zero or more new data rows at the bottom of the table

tbl.show() or str(tbl)

Convert the Txtble instance to a string showing a plain text table. Table cells and filler values that are not already strings are converted by calling str() on them; the exceptions are None values, which are displayed according to the none_str option (see below). All tab characters are expanded to spaces before building the table. If any of the resulting strings have indeterminate width (i.e., if wcwidth.wcswidth() returns a negative number for any of them), an IndeterminateWidthError (a subclass of ValueError) is raised.

Note that the resulting string will likely contain one or more embedded newlines, but (outside of some very odd cases) it will not end with a newline. This means that you can do print(tbl) and there won't be a blank line added at the end.

Configuration Options

These options can be set either as keywords passed to the Txtble constructor or as attributes on a Txtble instance:

tbl = Txtble(data, border=False)
# Same as:
tbl = Txtble(data)
tbl.border = False

align: Union[str, Sequence[str]] = ()

A sequence of alignment specifiers indicating how the contents of each column, in order, should be horizontally aligned. The alignment specifiers are 'l' (left alignment), 'c' (centered alignment), and 'r' (right alignment). align may optionally be set to a single alignment specifier to cause all columns to be aligned in that way.

An alignment specifier may optionally include 'n' to cause all numbers in the relevant column to be aligned on their decimal point; the 'l', 'c', or 'r' then determines how the "block" of numbers is aligned as a whole (This is generally only relevant if the column also contains a string value longer than any of the numbers). An alignment specifier of just 'n' is equivalent to 'ln' or 'nl'.

align_fill: str = 'l'

If there are more columns than there are entries in align, the extra columns will have their alignment set to align_fill.

border: Union[bool, BorderStyle] = True

Whether to draw a border around the edge of the table. border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the border around the edge of the table. Individual edges can be toggled or stylized by setting the bottom_border, left_border, right_border, and top_border options.

border_style: BorderStyle = ASCII_BORDERS

A BorderStyle instance specifying the characters to use for drawing all of the table's borders & rules. The border style can be overridden for individual borders by setting their respective options (border, column_border, etc.) to BorderStyle instances. See "BorderStyle" below for more information.

bottom_border: Union[bool, BorderStyle, None] = None

Whether to draw a border along the bottom edge of the table. The default value of None means to inherit the value set for border. bottom_border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the border along the bottom edge.

break_long_words: bool = True

Whether to force a line break in the middle of a word if said word is too long for the column's width

break_on_hyphens: bool = True

Whether to break on hyphens in addition to whitespace when wrapping text

column_border: Union[bool, BorderStyle] = True

Whether to draw a vertical rule between individual columns. column_border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the vertical rules between columns.

columns: Optional[int] = None

An optional positive integer. When set, show exactly the given number of columns per row, adding cells with row_fill and discarding extra cells as needed. If headers is also set, its length must equal columns or else a ValueError is raised. Setting both columns and headers causes header_fill to be ignored.

dict_fill: Any

If a header name does not appear as a key in a dict/mapping row, the value of dict_fill will be used for the corresponding cell value. If dict_fill is not set, a missing key will cause a KeyError to be raised.

header_border: Union[bool, BorderStyle, None] = None

Whether to draw a horizontal rule above the data rows, below the header row (if any). The default value of None means that the border will be drawn if & only if headers is non-None. header_border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the horizontal rule above the data rows.

If headers is None and top_border is set to a true value (or inherits a true value from border), the header border will not be drawn.

header_fill: Any = None

When headers is non-None and columns is None, this option determines how rows with more columns than there are headers are handled. When header_fill=None, any extra columns are discarded from long rows. For all other values, the header row will be extended to the length of the longest data row, and the new header cells will contain the header_fill value.

headers: Optional[list] = None

An optional list of cell values to display in a row at the top of the table. Setting this option also implicitly sets a minimum number of columns per row; see header_fill for allowing extra columns.

If headers is set to an empty list, header_fill must be set to a non-None value or else a ValueError will be raised upon trying to render the Txtble.

left_border: Union[bool, BorderStyle, None] = None

Whether to draw a border along the left edge of the table. The default value of None means to inherit the value set for border. left_border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the border along the left edge.

left_padding: Union[int, str, None] = None

Padding to insert on the left of every table cell. This can be either an integer (to insert that many space characters) or a string. If a string, it may not contain any newlines. The default value of None means to inherit the value set for padding.

len_func: Optional[Callable[[str], int]]

The function to use for calculating how many terminal cells wide a string is; it should take one string argument and return a width. Returning a negative width causes Txtble to raise an IndeterminateWidthError. The default value (also used when set to None) is with_color_stripped(wcwidth.wcswidth) (See "Other" below).

none_str: Any = ''

The string to display in place of None values (Setting none_str=None is the same as setting it to 'None')

padding: Union[int, str] = 0

Padding to insert on the left & right of every table cell. This can be either an integer (to insert that many space characters) or a string. If a string, it may not contain any newlines. Padding for the left and right of table cells can be specified separately via the left_padding and right_padding options.

right_border: Union[bool, BorderStyle, None] = None

Whether to draw a border along the right edge of the table. The default value of None means to inherit the value set for border. right_border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the border along the right edge.

right_padding: Union[int, str, None] = None

Padding to insert on the right of every table cell. This can be either an integer (to insert that many space characters) or a string. If a string, it may not contain any newlines. The default value of None means to inherit the value set for padding.

row_border: Union[bool, BorderStyle] = False

Whether to draw horizontal rules between data rows. row_border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the horizontal rules between data rows.

row_fill: Any = ''

If the rows of a table differ in number of columns, cells are added to the shorter rows until they all line up, and the added cells contain row_fill as their value.

rstrip: bool = True

When border=False, setting rstrip=False will cause the last cell of each row to still be padded with trailing whitespace and padding in order to reach the full column width. (Normally, this whitespace and padding is omitted when border=False as there is no end-of-line border to align.) This option is useful if you wish to append text to one or more lines of the output and have it appear strictly outside the table.

top_border: Union[bool, BorderStyle, None] = None

Whether to draw a border along the top edge of the table. The default value of None means to inherit the value set for border. top_border may optionally be set to a BorderStyle instance to set the characters used for drawing the border along the top edge.

valign: Union[str, Sequence[str]] = ()

A sequence of vertical alignment specifiers indicating how the contents of each column, in order, should be vertically aligned. The vertical alignment specifiers are 't' (top alignment), 'm' (middle alignment), and 'b' (bottom alignment). valign may optionally be set to a single vertical alignment specifier to cause all columns to be vertically aligned in that way.

valign_fill: str = 't'

If there are more columns than there are entries in valign, the extra columns will have their vertical alignment set to valign_fill.

width_fill: Optional[int] = None

If there are more columns than there are entries in widths, the extra columns will have their widths set to width_fill.

widths: Union[int, Sequence[Optional[int]], None] = ()

A sequence of integers specifying the width of each column, in order. Lines wider than the given width will be wrapped; the wrapping can be configured via the break_long_words and break_on_hyphens options. A width of None disables wrapping for that column and causes the column's width to be set to the width of the longest line. widths may optionally be set to a single width to cause all columns to be that wide.

wrap_func: Optional[Callable[[str, int], Iterable[str]]] = None

The function to use for wrapping long lines; it should take a string and a width and return an iterable of strings. The default value of None causes a custom function to be used that properly handles fullwidth characters, ANSI color escape sequences, etc.; if your table contains such strings, any user-supplied wrap_func must be able to handle them as well. When wrap_func is set to a user-supplied value, the break_long_words and break_on_hyphens options are ignored.

BorderStyle

The BorderStyle class is a namedtuple listing the strings to use for drawing a table's borders & rules. Its attributes are:

Attribute	Description	Example
hline	horizontal line	─
vline	vertical line	│
ulcorner	upper-left box corner	┌
urcorner	upper-right box corner	┐
llcorner	lower-left box corner	└
lrcorner	lower-right box corner	┘
vrtee	tee pointing right	├
vltee	tee pointing left	┤
dhtee	tee pointing down	┬
uhtee	tee pointing up	┴
plus	cross/four-way joint	┼

txtble provides the following predefined BorderStyle instances:

ASCII_BORDERS

The default border style. Draws borders using only the ASCII characters -, |, and +:

+-+-+
|A|B|
+-+-+
|C|D|
+-+-+

ASCII_EQ_BORDERS

Like ASCII_BORDERS, but uses = in place of -:

+=+=+
|A|B|
+=+=+
|C|D|
+=+=+

LIGHT_BORDERS

Uses the light box drawing characters:

┌─┬─┐
|A|B|
├─┼─┤
|C|D|
└─┴─┘

HEAVY_BORDERS

Uses the heavy box drawing characters:

┏━┳━┓
┃A┃B┃
┣━╋━┫
┃C┃D┃
┗━┻━┛

DOUBLE_BORDERS

Uses the double box drawing characters:

╔═╦═╗
║A║B║
╠═╬═╣
║C║D║
╚═╩═╝

DOT_BORDERS

Uses ⋯, ⋮, and ·:

·⋯·⋯·
⋮A⋮B⋮
·⋯·⋯·
⋮C⋮D⋮
·⋯·⋯·

If you define your own custom instances of BorderStyle, they must adhere to the following rules:

• The hline string must be exactly one terminal column wide (the same width as a space character).
• All strings other than hline must be the same width.
• No string may contain a newline.

Other

IndeterminateWidthError

Subclass of ValueError. Raised when a string is reported as having negative/indeterminate width. (For the default len_func, this happens when the string contains a DEL or a C0 or C1 control character other than a tab, newline, or ANSI color escape sequence.) The string in question is available as the exception's string attribute.

NumericWidthOverflowError

Subclass of ValueError. Raised when a column has a non-None width, the column's align value contains 'n', and aligning the numbers in the column along their decimal points would cause one or more cells to exceed the column's width.

UnterminatedColorError

Subclass of ValueError. Raised by with_color_stripped upon encountering an ANSI color escape sequence that is not eventually terminated by a reset/sgr0 sequence. The string in question is available as the exception's string attribute.

with_color_stripped

A function decorator for applying to len or imitators thereof that strips ANSI color sequences from a single string argument before passing it on. If any color sequences are not followed by a reset sequence, an UnterminatedColorError is raised.