On Tue, Jan 31, 2023 at 05:32:07PM -0500, Greg Wooledge wrote: > Again, a programming language can easily take an input string, measure > its length in characters, and produce an output string that looks like > a "box" around the input string. (Less easily if full Unicode is in play.)
Here's a simple bash function: tbox() { local len=$((${#1}+4)) row='########' while ((${#row} < len)); do row+=$row; done printf "%.${len}s\n# %s #\n%.${len}s\n" "$row" "$1" "$row" } Add that to your .bashrc and source it (or however you prefer to deal with bash functions), and then: unicorn:~$ tbox 'hello world' ############### # hello world # ############### Feel free to adapt it however you see fit.