How to print a table from lists with different lengths in Python

Question

How do I print a table from two lists that have varying lengths (each list being a column)?

Example:

>>> l1=['Cat', 'Dog', 'Gorilla', 'Ladybug']
>>> l2=['Cat', 'Dog']
>>> print_chart(l1, l2)
Cat        Cat
Dog        Dog
Gorilla
Ladybug

Using rjust may be useful.

Björn Pollex · Accepted Answer · 2011-07-23 20:13:09Z

6

for a, b in izip_longest(l1, l2, fillvalue=''):
    print "{0:20s}\t{1:20s}".format(a, b)

answered Jul 23, 2011 at 20:13

Björn Pollex

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2 Comments

+1. I might suggest as kwarg to izip_longest: fillvalue="" instead. But what you have is quite explicit which is of course the ultimate goal.

@Adam: I just read the documentation, but it didn't click. Thanks, fixed it.