NAME

       showtable - Show data in nicely formatted columns

USAGE

       showtable [-options] [file]

DESCRIPTION

       Showtable reads an input data stream and displays it in a nicely formatted listing, with
       exact formatting depending upon the options.  The input stream, file or "STDIN" by default
       should consist of data separated by tabs or the defined separator character (see -d).

       The actual output formatting is peformed by the ShowTable module.

OPTIONS

       There are two general sets of options: those which help determine the format of the input,
       and those which determine the format of the output.

   Options affecting input
       -break=str
                 Set the inter-column break string to "str".  The default is a tab (""\t"").  If
                 -strip is also given, blanks surrounding the break string will also be ignored.

       -dstr     This is the same as "-break="str.

       -nod(ashes)
                 Do not ignore lines of separators, such as dashes, equal signs, or underlines.
                 If -nodashes is given, and these lines do occur in the stream, they will be
                 treated as normal data.

       -ti(tles)[=NN]
                 Treat the first NN rows of data as column titles; multiple words in the column
                 titles may wrap vertically. If NN is omitted, it defaults to 1.  No -titles
                 option is the same as -titles=0.

       -in(put)=type
                 Set the input type as type, which can be one of: box, list, table, or simple.  A
                 simple-type table is the same as a table-type, but no wrapping characters are
                 recognized.

       -s(trip)  Strip blanks from around the column values.

       -nos(trip)
                 Do not strip blanks from the input.  Useful if there is formatted or aligned
                 data within a boxed table.

   Options affecting output
       -t(able)  Use a table format for output, with wrapping of column values longer than the
                 given or determined column widths.  See Data::ShowTable for more details.

       -si(mple) Use a simple table format, without any wrapping of column values.  See
                 Data::ShowTable for more details.

       -l(ist)   Use a list style format.  See Data::ShowTable for more details.

       -b(ox)    Use a "boxed" style table.  See Data::ShowTable for more details.

       -ht(ml)   Use HTML-formating.  See Data::ShowTable for more details.

       -ti(tles)=name1,name2,...,nameN
                 Define the column names explicitly.  This is useful for naming columns of data
                 from "STDIN", when showtable is being used as a filter.  The first column name,
                 name1, cannot begin with a digit.  This option allows any column titles obtained
                 from the input to be overridden.

       -noh(eaders)
                 Do not output any headers on the tables; -titles=0 implies this option.

       -fn1[,n2, ..., nN]
                 Select fields numbered n1, n2, etc., to display.  Each nN is a field index, or a
                 range of indexes in the form: "N"-"M" The default is to show all the fields in
                 each row.  Fields are numbered from 1.  An example:  to show the first, and
                 three through five fields of the "/etc/passwd" file:

                     showtable -d: -f1,2-5 /etc/passwd

       -fields=fname1[,fname2, ..., fnameN]
                 Select the named fields to display.  The field names must be available, either
                 through the data stream, or by using the -titles option.   The field names given
                 must match the existing field names exactly.

                 Using the file "/etc/passwd" for another example: to show the same first two
                 fields, by name:

                     showtable -d: -titles=Login,UID -fields=Login,UID /etc/passwd

       -w(idth)=num
                 Set the maximum table width.  This value is applied to the variable
                 Data::Showtable::Max_Table_Width.  When the total width of all columns to be
                 displayed exceeds this value, all column widths are scaled uniformly.

                 If -width is not given, then for all output but -html, the default value is
                 either ""COLUMNS"", if defined, or 80, if not.  Whith -html mode, there is no
                 default value for -width; in other words, there is no limit to the width.

       -cw(idths)=w1[,w2,...,wN]
                 Set individual column widths to the specified values.  Empty column widths imply
                 no maximum width.  If the -width option is also given, then the -cwidth column
                 widths can also be given as fractions or percentages.

                 Example: To set the maximum width of the third column to 20 characters:

                     -cw=,,20

   HTML-only options (the usage of which implies -html)
       -noe(scape)
                 Do not perform HTML escape sequences on the data; this allows embedded HTML text
                 in the data to be displayed properly with the -html option.

       -attributes='attr1 attr2 ...'
                 Declare the table attributes, which are inserted into the "TABLE" token.  For
                 example, the option:

                     -attributes='BORDER=0 CELLSPACING=2 CELLPADDING=4'

                 would cause the following HTML:

                     <TABLE BORDER=0 CELLSPACING=2 CELLPADDING=4>

                 The default table attributes are:

                     <TABLE BORDER=1 CELLSPACING=1 CELLPADDING=1>

       -t(itle)_f(ormats)=fmt1;fmt2;...;fmtN
                 Set the HTML formats for the column titles.  The -title_formats (or just -tf)
                 can be given multiple times, for each column, or formats for multiple columns
                 can be given on the same option separated by semi-colons "";"".

                 Each fmtN can itself be multiple HTML items, separated by commas.  Each HTML
                 element can be given either as an HTML token (eg: ""\<BOLD\">"), or as a plain
                 name (eg: ""BOLD"").

                 For example, here is a title format specification for three columns, where the
                 first column title should be bold italic, the second italic, and the third
                 italic in a smaller font:

                         -tf='BOLD,I;I;<FONT SIZE=-2>,I'

       -d(ata)_f(formats)=fmt1;fmt2;...;fmtN
                 The same as -title_formats but applies to the column data.

       -url(s)=col1=url1,col2=url2,...
                 Define a mapping from column names, or indexes, to URLs to be inserted as <A
                 HREF's> around the values for the named columns.  Each colN is a column name or
                 index, and each urlN is a string representing the URL to be inserted for the
                 given column.

                 The URL text may contain these substitution strings:

                 %K - will be substituted with the current column name (or key).

                 %V - will be substituted with the current column value.

                 Multiple -url options may be given, if desired, rather than creating one long
                 argument for a single -url.  For example:

                     showtable   -d: -f1,6 -titles=Login,Homedir \
                                 -url='Login=mailto:%V' \
                                 -url='HomeDir=file:%V' \
                                 /etc/passwd

   Other options
       -help     Display some help to the user and quit.

   Boxed Input
       If the input type is box, then vertical and horizontal box characters are removed from the
       input stream, and blanks surrounding the vertical box characters are removed.  The
       vertical box characters (column separaters) are ""|"" or "":"".  The The horizontal box
       characters are ""+"" and ""-"".

       Morever, data wrapped within a column is recognized and parsed as one column value, by
       recognizing the presence of a wrapping prefix or wrapping suffix character.  Currently,
       the wrapping prefix character is "<", and the wrapping suffix character is ">".

       An example of data wrapped within a column is given here.  The table below has just two
       logical rows of data; with both rows having data wrapped into multiple physical rows.

               +---------+---------+---------+
               |  Col 1  |  Col 2  |  Col 3  |
               +---------+---------+---------+
               | This is>| Another>| Row 1,3>|
               |< a cont>|< value. |<is also>|
               |<inued  >|         |<long.   |
               |<value.  |         |         |
               |This is >| Item2-2 | Item2-3 |
               +---------+---------+---------+

   List Format
       When using the -list or -input=list options, either, or both, the input and output may be
       in a "list" format, which is implemented using the following syntax:

               r1c1_name: r1c1_value
               r1c2_name: r1c2_value
               ...
               r1cN_name: r1cN_value

               r2c1_name: r2c1_value
               r2c2_name: r2c2_value
                        : r2c2_value_continued
               ...
               r2cN_name: r2cN_value

               rMc1_name: rMc1_value
               rMc2_name: rMc2_value
               ...
               rMcN_name: rMcN_value

       Each row of data consists of one or more columns, and ends with a blank line.

       Each column consists of a column name, followed by a colon ":", followed by an optional,
       single space or tab, followed by the column value, on the same line.

       Continuation lines of the previous column value consist of one or more space or tab
       characters, a colon ":", one optional, single space or tab, followed by the continuation
       value.  In the example above, The second column value of the second row was continued.

   HTML Input with HTML Output
       When using -html on data already containing HTML-formatted text, the -noescape option
       should be used.  By default, all input text is assumed not to be HTML-formatted, and is
       escaped allowing embedded "<", ">" characters, if any, to be displayed correctly.

DEPENDENCIES

       Data::ShowTable module
                 Performs the actual output formatting.

AUTHOR

       Alan K. Stebbens aks@stebbens.org

BUGS

       •    Currently, the box formatting characters are not configurable: '+' for the corners;
            '-' and '|' for the tops and sides, respectively.  In an ideal world, these things
            would be configurable.

       •    The continuation prefix and suffix characters, '<' and '>', respectively, are also
            not configurable:

       •    When reading table input, any data ending with ">" will be considered to be continued
            by the next row of data.  To avoid this, use -input=simple.

       •    When selecting noncontiguous fields (ie: -f1,4>) without field names, the default
            field names will be consecutively numbered from 1, which is counter-intuitive to the
            original selection.  To avoid this, name the fields using the -title=...  option.