NAME

       Text::Tabs - expand and unexpand tabs like unix expand(1) and unexpand(1)

SYNOPSIS

         use Text::Tabs;

         $tabstop = 4;  # default = 8
         @lines_without_tabs = expand(@lines_with_tabs);
         @lines_with_tabs = unexpand(@lines_without_tabs);

DESCRIPTION

       Text::Tabs does most of what the unix utilities expand(1) and unexpand(1) do.  Given a line with tabs in
       it, "expand" replaces those tabs with the appropriate number of spaces.  Given a line with or without
       tabs in it, "unexpand" adds tabs when it can save bytes by doing so, like the "unexpand -a" command.

       Unlike the old unix utilities, this module correctly accounts for any Unicode combining characters (such
       as diacriticals) that may occur in each line for both expansion and unexpansion.  These are overstrike
       characters that do not increment the logical position.  Make sure you have the appropriate Unicode
       settings enabled.

EXPORTS

       The following are exported:

       expand
       unexpand
       $tabstop
           The $tabstop variable controls how many column positions apart each tabstop is.  The default is 8.

           Please note that "local($tabstop)" doesn't do the right thing and if you want to use "local" to
           override $tabstop, you need to use "local($Text::Tabs::tabstop)".

EXAMPLE

         #!perl
         # unexpand -a
         use Text::Tabs;

         while (<>) {
           print unexpand $_;
         }

       Instead of the shell's "expand" command, use:

         perl -MText::Tabs -n -e 'print expand $_'

       Instead of the shell's "unexpand -a" command, use:

         perl -MText::Tabs -n -e 'print unexpand $_'

SUBVERSION

       This module comes in two flavors: one for modern perls (5.10 and above) and one for ancient obsolete
       perls.  The version for modern perls has support for Unicode.  The version for old perls does not.  You
       can tell which version you have installed by looking at $Text::Tabs::SUBVERSION: it is "old" for obsolete
       perls and "modern" for current perls.

       This man page is for the version for modern perls and so that's probably what you've got.

BUGS

       Text::Tabs handles only tabs ("\t") and combining characters ("/\pM/").  It doesn't count backwards for
       backspaces ("\t"), omit other non-printing control characters ("/\pC/"), or otherwise deal with any other
       zero-, half-, and full-width characters.

LICENSE

       Copyright (C) 1996-2002,2005,2006 David Muir Sharnoff.  Copyright (C) 2005 Aristotle Pagaltzis Copyright
       (C) 2012-2013 Google, Inc.  This module may be modified, used, copied, and redistributed at your own
       risk.  Although allowed by the preceding license, please do not publicly redistribute modified versions
       of this code with the name "Text::Tabs" unless it passes the unmodified Text::Tabs test suite.