setting irregular tab stops

cmglenn · Post by **cmglenn** » Mon May 05, 2003 5:37 pm

I tried following the instructions in the help file, and I can only assume I have some setting wrong.

I am using textpad for data entry for a non-delimited file. There are two versions of the questionnaire. The second version has empty columns for 1-29, then is skips the last 6 columns, then adds 12 more columns after that.

The first version has numbers in columns 1-67. The second version has numbers in columns 30-61, 68-79.

As I enter the second version data, I set one tab stop to 29 and another to 6 (when adding the tab stops, they are sorted so 6 is listed before 29). I use convert new tabs to spaces. [prefs>doc classes>default>tabulation]

In the data file, at the end of a line, when I press enter, it automatically tabs to position 30 (that is, I don't press tab to insert the 29 lines). This is okay but unexpected.

I enter the data through column 61, then press tab, but it only inserts 3 spaces, not 6 as requested.

When I changed 6 to 9 spaces, it made no difference; it still added only 3 spaces for this second tab.

What did I do wrong? I was looking for some 'absolute versus relative' tabbing, thinking I was using absolute, but I can't find help on these terms.

cglenn · Post by **cglenn** » Mon May 05, 2003 5:47 pm

[addendum...first time poster thought he was logged on when posting, see no way to edit a guest post]

Well, I figured out it is not the number of spaces from the cursor but the number of spaces from the left margin (this was not stated in the help file).

But, I would like an explanation about the automatic tab of 29 spaces. Since I presorted the questionnaires, it is not a problem, but...

What if I had these intermixed, so that only some times I want to use the tab stops. In this case I do not want to press return and find myelf in column 30. Is there a setting for this, that is, only tab when tab is pressed?