show-data¶ ↑

Ruby library to display any data in a pretty way.

Author: Alan K. Stebbens, copyright 2008-2014.

Certain principles are applied for increased readability, with an aesthetically pleasing presentation:

• array values are presented on separate lines

• array indexes are formatted with fixed widths

• array values are left-aligned

• hashes are formatted with the keys right-aligned with the values left-aligned.

• nested values are properly aligned

• recognize and format ‘struct` and `ostruct` types.

Usage:¶ ↑

require 'show_data'
...
show_data any_data

Use ‘format_data` to capture the data presentation as a string, in order to use it in another output stream. Example:

Logger.log format_data(some_data)

Examples of output:

array = [ 1, 2, 3, 10, 11, 12, 1.2, 34.567, 'apple', 'banana', 'cherry', :symbol1, :symbol2,
        Date.parse("2005-12-25"), Time.parse("2006-07-04 12:01:02") ]
show_data array

The output of the array data:

[[00]: 1,
 [01]: 2,
 [02]: 3,
 [03]: 10,
 [04]: 11,
 [05]: 12,
 [06]: 1.2,
 [07]: 34.567,
 [08]: "apple",
 [09]: "banana",
 [10]: "cherry",
 [11]: :symbol1,
 [12]: :symbol2,
 [13]: 2005-12-25,
 [14]: 2006-07-04 12:01:02 -0700
]

Notice that the array indexes are uniform (for 2 digits), while the values are left aligned – both for readability.

An example of hashed data:

ahash = { 'a' => 'apple', 'b' => 'banana', 'c' => 'cherry' }
show_data ahash

The hashed data output:

{ 'a' => "apple",
  'b' => "banana",
  'c' => "cherry"
}

An example of nested array data:

nested = [ [ 'a', 1.2, 'b' ], [ 'd', :symbol ], [ [ 'ape', 'monkey', 'chimp' ], [ 'banana', 'leaves' ], 2.99 ] ]
show_data nested

The output of the nested array data:

[[0]: [[0]: "a",
       [1]: 1.2,
       [2]: "b"
      ],
 [1]: [[0]: "d",
       [1]: :symbol
      ],
 [2]: [[0]: [[0]: "ape",
             [1]: "monkey",
             [2]: "chimp"
            ],
       [1]: [[0]: "banana",
             [1]: "leaves"
            ],
       [2]: 2.99
      ]
]

Note that the nested array indexes are aligned independently of the first-level array indexes.

Of course, hash and array data can be mixed (using the values from the previous examples):

combo = [ ahash, ahash.invert, nested ]
show_data combo

The output of the combined array and hashes:

[[0]: { 'a' => "apple",
        'b' => "banana",
        'c' => "cherry"
      },
 [1]: {  'apple' => "a",
        'banana' => "b",
        'cherry' => "c"
      },
 [2]: [[0]: [[0]: "a",
             [1]: 1.2,
             [2]: "b"
            ],
       [1]: [[0]: "d",
             [1]: :symbol
            ],
       [2]: [[0]: [[0]: "ape",
                   [1]: "monkey",
                   [2]: "chimp"
                  ],
             [1]: [[0]: "banana",
                   [1]: "leaves"
                  ],
             [2]: 2.99
            ]
      ]
]

Notice that the 2nd array item, an inverted hash, has its keys right aligned, in order to ease readability of the key - value pairs.

Contributing to show_data¶ ↑

• Check out the latest master to make sure the feature hasn’t been implemented or the bug hasn’t been fixed yet.

• Check out the issue tracker to make sure someone already hasn’t requested it and/or contributed it.

• Fork the project.

• Start a feature/bugfix branch.

• Commit and push until you are happy with your contribution.

• Make sure to add tests for it. This is important so I don’t break it in a future version unintentionally.

• Please try not to mess with the Rakefile, version, or history. If you want to have your own version, or is otherwise necessary, that is fine, but please isolate to its own commit so I can cherry-pick around it.

Copyright¶ ↑

Copyright © 2008-2014 Alan Stebbens. See LICENSE.txt for further details.