Re: [PATCH] Make tests expect [ \t]+ pattern instead of \t for "info reg" command

[Ruslan Kabatsayev <b7.10110111@gmail.com>]

On 18 January 2018 at 18:18, Yao Qi <qiyaoltc@gmail.com> wrote:
> Ruslan Kabatsayev <b7.10110111@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> This will allow to format output of "info reg" command as we wish,
>
> What output format do you wish?
>
>> without breaking the tests. In particular, it'll let us correctly align
>> raw and natural values of the registers using spaces instead of current
>> badly-working approach with tabs.
>
> Why alignment with tabs is "badly-working"?  Do you have some other
> patches to change the output of "info reg"?

For your questions of "what format" and "why current is bad" please
see my previously sent (but not applied) patch:
https://sourceware.org/ml/gdb-patches/2017-07/msg00046.html
(and its follow-up version 2:
https://sourceware.org/ml/gdb-patches/2017-07/msg00406.html ).
In short, "info reg" prints three columns, and the third one is
aligned by a single tab. This works well only in two cases: all
registers have short hex values (i.e. less than 8 chars wide), or all
have long values. Then the tab shifts the third column of values to
the same terminal character column.
Initially (in the patch linked above) I wanted to preserve the tab and
only pad it with subsequent spaces to a fixed column, thus avoiding
breaking the tests, but after the discussion I understood that it's
too hacky to be a solution, and it's better to fix the tests and then
use space-only alignment, similarly to what is done with the second
column.

As for "some other patches", I don't have any particular change in
mind currently.

>
> --
> Yao (齐尧)