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Re: Tentative conclusion: Mathematica cannot output plain text

  • To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
  • Subject: [mg39828] Re: Tentative conclusion: Mathematica cannot output plain text
  • From: Rolf Mertig <rolf at mertig.com>
  • Date: Sat, 8 Mar 2003 02:48:31 -0500 (EST)
  • Organization: Mertig Consulting
  • Reply-to: rolf at mertig.com
  • Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com

<Because of the lack of response to my previous 2 
<queries, I take it that it is impossible to get 
<Mathematica's front end to produce notebook output in 
<plain text.  Is this a correct statement?
Not quite. With a little help of the Kernel it is possible, 
even for the notebook Mathematica front end:

PrintNodeCoordinates[xyzcoor_] := 
  Module[{numnod = Length[xyzcoor], t, n, c, tt, mx, nt}, 
    t = Table["   ", {numnod + 1}, {4}];
    For[n = 1, n <= numnod, n++, c = xyzcoor[[n]];
      If[Length[c] <= 2, AppendTo[c, 0]];
      If[Length[c] == 1, AppendTo[c, 0]];
      t[[n + 1, 1]] = ToString[n];
      t[[n + 1, 2]] = c[[1]];
      t[[n + 1, 3]] = c[[2]];
      t[[n + 1, 4]] = c[[3]]];;
    t[[1]] = {"node", "x", "y", "z"};
    tt = Map[ToString, t, {2}];
    mx = Max[Map[StringLength, tt, {2}]];
    nt = Map[(StringJoin @@ PadLeft[{#}, mx - StringLength[#], " "]) &, 
        tt, {2}];
    Print @ StringDrop[ExportString[nt, "Table"], -1]
    ]; PrintNodeCoordinates[{{2, 3, 2000}, {5, a + b, 168.09}, {x_dir, y_dir, 
      z_dir}}]

This gives (unformatted)  Cell[BoxData["\<\" node .... \"\>"], "Print"], which 
is quite plain text.

BTW: does anybody know if there exists a ConversionOptions setting 
for ExportString to not get the "\n" at the end of ExportString? Right now
ExportString[{"a"},"Table"] returns "a\n" .
This may be fine in some situations, but not for the case above (this is why I 
added the StringDrop[ ,-1]

There should be more ConversionOptions documentation really.
E.g., does Export[ { { ... }, ... {} }, "Table" ]also take ConversionOptions
similar to TableForm? I don't know ... (anybody?, PJ?)

Maybe one could also get this type of formatting with J/Link and the 
apropriate Java (JTable?) classes, but I found this too complicated.

Rolf Mertig
Mertig Consulting
http://www.mertig.com
http://www.mathxls.com 


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