Tabulating data strings?

[macca21]

How can I tabulate the data strings I have saved in another file...
the data sored is in the form of names and scores. The table should look like:

Name Score 1 Score 2 Score 3
==== ======= ======= =======

John 23 21 34
etc...

I've started with this and need help adapting it to produce a table and it needs to us the split function, explanations would be very useful too!:

def main():
f = open( "data_file_1.dat", "r" )
line = f.readline()
while len(line) !=0:
print line
line = f.readline()
main()

Help with the code?
Thanks in advance!

[d5e5]

Could you attach a copy of data_file_1.dat to your post? Or if you could post some of the data (within code tags) it would make it easier to help you with this.

[jice]

A better way to deal with text files is rather with for loop :

of=open(myoutfilename, 'w')
for line in open(myfilename,'r'):
    print line
    of.write(line.replace(' ', '\t'))
of.close()

######### OR ##############
# not sure the 2 with on the same line work (and i can't test it right now)
# this would be a preferred way (even if i use the first one)

with open(myfilename,'r') as f, with open(myoutfilename,'w') as of:
    for line in f:
        print line
        of.write(line.replace(' ', '\t'))

if replacing the spaces is enough in your case

[macca21]

ok, here's the data..., changed filetype to txt for uploading

[vegaseat]

You can expand on something simple like that ...

''' contents of data_file_1.txt -->
Fred, Nurke, 16, 17, 22
Jack, Sprat, 12, 13, 19
George, Reynolds, 14, 11, 30
Harry, Smith, 19, 19, 37
Daniel, Robins, 10, 8, 22
Jacquiline, Stevens, 23, 18, 31
Erin, Collins, 24, 30, 35
William, Steadford, 12, 15, 20
Laura, Schmidt, 25, 27, 36
Nikki, Dimitri, 14, 17, 24
'''

with open('data_file_1.txt', 'r') as fin:
    print("%-20s %5s %5s %5s" % ('name', 'score1', 'score2', 'score3'))
    for line in fin:
        # strip trailing newline char
        line = line.rstrip()
        first, last, score1, score2, score3 = line.split(',')
        name = first + last
        print("%-20s %5s %5s %5s" % (name, score1, score2, score3))

[TrustyTony]

Neat coding vegaseat:

first, last, score1, score2, score3 = line.split(',')