Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!tektronix!nosun!dawson.fpssun.fps.com!dawson
From: dawson@fpssun.fps.com (Bryan Dawson ext 1184)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: tabs converted to spaces?
Summary: expand is the correct tool to convert tabs to spaces
Keywords: expand
Message-ID: <288@dawson.fpssun.fps.com>
Date: 25 Jul 88 16:41:07 GMT
References: <3940001@hpgrla.HP.COM> <187@alobar.ATT.COM> <4425@ptsfa.PacBell.COM>
Organization: Floating Point Systems
Lines: 12

In article <4425@ptsfa.PacBell.COM>, dmt@ptsfa.PacBell.COM (Dave Turner) writes:
> In article <3940001@hpgrla.HP.COM> douglasg@hpgrla.HP.COM (@Douglas Genetten) writes:
> >Is there a filter which converts tabs to n-spaces throughout
> >a file?
> 
> You might try newform and/or sed.

Several replies have mentioned tr or sed. I assume that the desired
result is to convert tabs to spaces *in a fomat preserving manner*.
The correct standard tool to do this in UNIX is expand. Expand is
designed to perform exactly this function (and its inverse 'unexpand')
and does so very well.