# Print string on specific character position

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/print-string-on-specific-character-position/121402>\
**Category:** General Usage\
**Tags:** strings, formatting\
**Created:** [October 16, 2024, 11:16pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/print-string-on-specific-character-position/121402 "2024-10-16T23:16:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![danrib07](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/danrib07/32/212751_2.png) [@danrib07](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/danrib07)\
**Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 11:16pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/print-string-on-specific-character-position/121402/1 "2024-10-16T23:16:21Z")

</div>

Hi everyone, I’m trying to format some diagnostics for a Julia project I’m working on, and I was wondering if there’s a way to format strings such that the output is printed on a specific character position? For example, let’s say I have the following:

```julia
person = ["Adam" "Jennifer" "David"]
age = [25 34 57]

for i in zip(person, age)
    println(i[1] * "------" * string(i[2]))
end

```

which prints the following output:

```julia
Adam------25
Jennifer------34
David------57

```

My question is: is there a method to print `------` and `i[2]` on specific character positions? For example, if we say the beginning of each line is position zero, how would I go about printing the `------` starting on character position 12 and `i[2]` on character position 24?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![jules](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/41988e/32.png) [@jules](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/jules)\
**Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 11:21pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/print-string-on-specific-character-position/121402/2 "2024-10-16T23:21:16Z")

</div>

Like this?

```julia
person = ["Adam" "Jennifer" "David"]
age = [25 34 57]

for i in zip(person, age)
    println(rpad(i[1], 12), "-" ^ 6, " " ^ 6, i[2])
end

```

```julia
Adam ------ 25
Jennifer ------ 34
David ------ 57

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![danrib07](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/danrib07/32/212751_2.png) [@danrib07](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/danrib07)\
**Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 11:24pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/print-string-on-specific-character-position/121402/3 "2024-10-16T23:24:50Z")

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yes, that’s exactly the formatting I’m looking for. Thank you!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![rafael.guerra](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/rafael.guerra/32/216610_2.png) [@rafael.guerra](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/rafael.guerra)\
**Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 12:57pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/print-string-on-specific-character-position/121402/4 "2024-10-17T12:57:41Z")

</div>

Fyi, Julia also allows writing the compact form:

```julia
@. println(rpad(person, 12, '-'), age);

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![fatteneder](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/fatteneder/32/33991_2.png) [@fatteneder](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/fatteneder)\
**Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 1:13pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/print-string-on-specific-character-position/121402/5 "2024-10-17T13:13:17Z")

</div>

Here is a `Printf` solution

```julia
using Printf

person = ["Adam" "Jennifer" "David"]
age = [25 34 57]

for i in 1:3
   @printf "%-12s%-12s%d\n" person[i] "-"^6 age[i]
end

```

```julia
Adam ------ 25
Jennifer ------ 34
David ------ 57

```