104
The
VIC
20
User
Guide
PRINT
FORMAnlNG
FUNCTIONS
We
use the word formatting to describe the process
of
arranging
information on a display (or a printout) to make it easier to understand or
more pleasing to the eye. Given the
PRINT
statement and nothing else,
formatting could become a complex and painful chore.
For
example, sup-
pose you want to display a heading in the middle
of
the top line of the
display. Does that mean displaying space codes until you reach the first
heading character position? Not only would that be time-consuming and
likely to cause errors, but it would also waste a lot
of
memory, since each
space code must be converted into a computer instruction. Fortunately, VIC
BASIC provides three
PRINT
formatting aids: the SPC, TAB, and POS
functions.
SPC
FUNCTION
SPC
is
a space-over function. You include
SPC
as one
of
the terms in a
PRINT statement. After the letters SPC you include, in parentheses, the
number
of
character positions that you wish to space over.
For
example,
you could display a heading beginning
at
the leftmost character position
of
the display as follows:
10
PRINT"HEFIDINfJ"
To center the heading on the screen you would first space over eight
character positions, as follows:
10
PRINT
SPC(S);"HEADXNfJ"
Notice the semicolon after the SPC function. A comma after SPC will
start displaying text
at
the next II-character boundary following the
number of spaces specified by SPC.
When you include the
SPC
function in a
PRINT
statement you simply
cause the next printed
or
displayed character to be moved over by the
number
of
positions specified after SPC; no other
PRINT
statement syntax
is
changed.
TAB
FUNCTION
TAB
is
a tabbing function similar to typewriter tabbing.
Suppose you want to print
or
display information in columns. You
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