Formatting tables for console output

[Cyrus]

I am writing a class which formats console output as a table. It displays the type of an entry, the name of an entry, and the data for an entry. I am stuck on a required for loop which appends a tab character to a string, for formatting it as a table. It doesn't seem to be adding any of the tabs and I can't tell what I've done wrong. As far as I can tell the contents of the loop are never reached, and I can't make sense of it.

The ConsoleWriter class that contains the code that is in error...

package frontend;

public class ConsoleWriter {
	private static String tabbedData(String data, int min) {		
		System.out.println(); //for debug
		
		int tabcount = 0;
		int len=8*min;
					
		while (data.length() <= len) {
			tabcount = len / 8;
			if (len > 0) len = len - 8;
			else {
				len = 1;
				break;
			}
		}
		
		System.out.println("debug: tabcount=" + tabcount);
		System.out.print("debug adding tabs... ");
		for (int x=0; x == tabcount; x++) {
			System.out.print("tab ");
			data = data + "\t";
		}
		System.out.println(); //for debug
		
		return data;
	}
	
	public static void dataHead() {
		System.out.println("TYPE\tNAME\t\t\tVALUE");
	}
	
	public static void dataLine(String type, String name, String data) {
		//Prepare for the worst mathematics in the world because I'm tired.
		//This could land me a job at mtgox.
		System.out.println(type + "\t" + tabbedData(name, 3) + data);
	}
}

The main method is in a testing class intended to test this class.

package test;

import frontend.ConsoleWriter;

public class feConsoleWriter {
	/**
	 * @param args
	 */
	public static void main(String[] args) {
		ConsoleWriter.dataHead();
		ConsoleWriter.dataLine("text", "short", "some data here");
		ConsoleWriter.dataLine("text", "longerversionxx", "some data here");
		ConsoleWriter.dataLine("text", "evenlongerstillxxxxxxxx", "some data here");
	}

}

The output...

TYPE	NAME			VALUE

debug: tabcount=1
adding tabs... 
text	shortsome data here

debug: tabcount=2
adding tabs... 
text	longerversionxxsome data here

debug: tabcount=3
adding tabs... 
text	evenlongerstillxxxxxxxxsome data here

[Norm]

Can you post what the output is supposed to look like?

[Cyrus]

It should look exactly like this...

TYPE	NAME			VALUE

debug: tabcount=1
adding tabs... tab
text	shortsome			 data here

debug: tabcount=2
adding tabs... tab tab 
text	longerversionxxsome		 data here

debug: tabcount=3
adding tabs... tab tab tab
text	evenlongerstillxxxxxxxxsome	 data here

[Norm]

Review how the conditional part of a for statement works.
If the condition is false, the for is NOT executed.
See line 21.

[Cyrus]

Just for the sake of future people Googling this, here is the finished product with remaining bugs removed.

package frontend;

public class ConsoleWriter {
	private static String tabbedData(String data, int min) {		
		//System.out.println(); //for debug
		
		int tabcount=0;
		int len=8*min;
					
		while (data.length() < len) {
			tabcount++;
			len = len - 8;
		}
		
		System.out.println("debug: tabcount=" + tabcount);
		//System.out.print("debug adding tabs... ");
		for (int x=0; x < tabcount; x++) {
			//System.out.print("tab ");
			data = data + "\t";
		}
		//System.out.println(); //for debug
		
		return data;
	}
	
	public static void dataHead() {
		System.out.println("TYPE\tNAME\t\t\tVALUE");
	}
	
	public static void dataLine(String type, String name, String data) {
		System.out.println(type + "\t" + tabbedData(name, 3) + data);
	}
}

And, thanks!