formatDL {base} | R Documentation

## Format Description Lists

### Description

Format vectors of items and their descriptions as 2-column tables or LaTeX-style description lists.

### Usage

    formatDL(x, y, style = c("table", "list"),
             width = 0.9 * getOption("width"), indent = NULL)

### Arguments

`x` | a vector giving the items to be described, or a list of length 2 or a matrix with 2 columns giving both items and descriptions.
`y` | a vector of the same length as `x` with the corresponding descriptions. Only used if `x` does not already give the descriptions.
`style` | a character string specifying the rendering style of the description information. If `"table"`, a two-column table with items and descriptions as columns is produced (similar to Texinfo's `@table` environment. If `"list"`, a LaTeX-style tagged description list is obtained.
`width` | a positive integer giving the target column for wrapping lines in the output.
`indent` | a positive integer specifying the indentation of the second column in table style, and the indentation of continuation lines in list style. Must not be greater than `width/2`, and defaults to `width/3` for table style and `width/9` for list style.

### Details

After extracting the vectors of items and corresponding descriptions from the arguments, both are coerced to character vectors.

In table style, items with more than `indent - 3` characters are displayed on a line of their own.

### Value

a character vector with the formatted entries.

### Examples

    ## Use R to create the 'INDEX' for package 'splines' from its 'CONTENTS'
    x <- read.dcf(file = system.file("CONTENTS", package = "splines"),
                   fields = c("Entry", "Description"))
    x <- as.data.frame(x)
    writeLines(formatDL(x$Entry, x$Description))
    ## or equivalently: writeLines(formatDL(x))
    ## Same information in tagged description list style:
    writeLines(formatDL(x$Entry, x$Description, style = "list"))
    ## or equivalently: writeLines(formatDL(x, style = "list"))

[Package base version 2.9.2 Index]