Quick insert of characters into a column?

Quick insert of characters into a column?

[Chad]

Hi,

I'm using emacs to edit a latex file to create a table with many rows,
say 20.  I need to insert & to separate the columns, so I need a
column of 20 ampersands.

What is the quickest way to do this?  I'd like to highlight a region
(column) and then tell emacs to insert the ampersand into that region,
but I can't figure out how to do this.

Thanks for your help!

Chad

Re: Quick insert of characters into a column?

[Joost Kremers]

Chad wrote:
> I'm using emacs to edit a latex file to create a table with many rows,
> say 20.  I need to insert & to separate the columns, so I need a
> column of 20 ampersands.
>
> What is the quickest way to do this?  I'd like to highlight a region
> (column) and then tell emacs to insert the ampersand into that region,
> but I can't figure out how to do this.

M-x string-insert-rectangle


-- 
Joost Kremers                                      joostkremers@yahoo.com
Selbst in die Unterwelt dringt durch Spalten Licht
EN:SiS(9)

Re: Quick insert of characters into a column?

[harven]

Chad <chad.jones@gmail.com> writes:

> Hi,
>
> I'm using emacs to edit a latex file to create a table with many rows,
> say 20.  I need to insert & to separate the columns, so I need a
> column of 20 ampersands.
>
> What is the quickest way to do this?  I'd like to highlight a region
> (column) and then tell emacs to insert the ampersand into that region,
> but I can't figure out how to do this.
>
> Thanks for your help!
>
> Chad

Instead of manually creating the table, I would suggest using templates
provided by emacs. 

M-x table-insert

you are then prompted for the number of columns, of rows, the width
of the cell and their height.

Fill the template if you want. When you're done, generate the latex source with

M-x table-generate-source

you are then prompted for the language (latex), the name of a buffer
where goes the result, and a title for the table. That's it.
If you didn't fill the template, you get something like this

% This LaTeX table template is generated by emacs 22.1.1
\begin{tabular}{|l|l|l|}
\hline
lala & ceci & tous \\
\hline
 & & \\
\hline
 & & \\
...
\hline
 & & \\
\hline
 & & \\
\hline
\end{tabular}

Have a look at the wiki for more details
http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/TableMode

Re: Quick insert of characters into a column?

[Chad]

These are both excellent suggestions, just what I needed.  Thanks very
much!
-- Chad

Re: Quick insert of characters into a column?

[Ken Goldman]

Search the docs for 'rectangle'

Specifically

C-x r t runs the command string-rectangle
    which is an interactive compiled Lisp function in `rect'.
(string-rectangle START END STRING)

Replace rectangle contents with STRING on each line.
The length of STRING need not be the same as the rectangle width.

Chad wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I'm using emacs to edit a latex file to create a table with many rows,
> say 20.  I need to insert & to separate the columns, so I need a
> column of 20 ampersands.
> 
> What is the quickest way to do this?  I'd like to highlight a region
> (column) and then tell emacs to insert the ampersand into that region,
> but I can't figure out how to do this.
> 
> Thanks for your help!
> 
> Chad