Variable table width with .format

I'm trying to display data from a csv in a text table. I've got to the point where it displays everything that I need, however the table width still has to be set, meaning if the data is longer than the number set then issues begin.

I currently print the table using .format to sort out formatting, is there a way to set the width of the data to a variable that is dependant on the length of the longest piece of data?

for i in range(len(list_l)):
    if i == 0:
        print(h_dashes)
        print('{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}'.format('|', (list_l[i][0].upper()),'|', (list_l[i][1].upper()),'|',(list_l[i][2].upper()),'|', (list_l[i][3].upper()),'|'))
        print(h_dashes)
    else:
        print('{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}{:^26s}{:^1s}'.format('|', list_l[i][0], '|', list_l[i][1], '|', list_l[i][2],'|', list_l[i][3],'|'))

I realise that the code is far from perfect, however I'm still a newbie so it's piecemeal from various tutorials

Solution

You can actually use a two-pass approach to first get the correct lengths. As per your example with four fields per line, the following shows the basic idea you can use.

What follows is an example of the two-pass approach, first to get the maximum lengths for each field, the other to do what you're currently doing (with the calculated rather than fixed lengths):

# Can set MINIMUM lengths here if desired, eg: lengths = [10, 0, 41, 7]

lengths = [0] * 4
fmtstr = None

for pass in range(2):
    for i in range(len(list_l)):
        if pass == 0:
            # First pass sets lengths as per data.

            for field in range(4):
                lengths[field] = max(lengths[field], len(list_l[i][field])
        else:
            # Second pass prints the data.

            # First, set format string if not yet set.

            if fmtstr is None:
                fmtstr = '|'
                for item in lengths:
                    fmtstr += '{:^%ds}|' % (item)

            # Now print item (and header stuff if first item).

            if i == 0: print(h_dashes)
            print(fmtstr.format(list_l[i][0].upper(), list_l[i][1].upper(), list_l[i][2].upper(), list_l[i][3].upper()))
            if i == 0: print(h_dashes)

The construction of the format string is done the first time you process an item in pass two.

It does so by taking a collection like [31,41,59] and giving you the string:

|{:^31s}|{:^41s}|{:^59s}|

There's little point using all those {:^1s} format specifiers when the | is not actually a varying item - you may as well code it directly into the format string.