Right-align text in Emacs -

sometimes, have text file in emacs:

some text     123     17 other text    1       0 still more    12      8 last 1      1234    123 

i right-align numbers (using spaces), changing this:

some text      123     17 other text       1      0 still more      12      8 last 1      1234    123 

how can done in emacs?

align-regexp can this. mark region, , use:

c-um-x align-regexp ret \(\s-+[0-9]*\)[0-9] ret -1 ret 4 ret y

that should simplest approach.

(edit: in fact, don't need separate out final digit; \(\s-+[0-9]+\) works regexp.)

see interactive prompts , c-hf align-regexp ret , align-rules-list variable doing.

the noteworthy part specifying negative number group, align-regexp sets justify attribute:

`justify'    possible `regexp' , `group' identify character group contains more whitespace characters.  default, non-whitespace characters in group deleted while aligning alignment character.  however, if `justify' attribute set non-nil value, initial whitespace characters within group deleted.  has effect of right-justifying characters remain, , can used outdenting or plain old right- justification. 

alternatively various table-editing options can deal (e.g. org, ses, table-capture/release), or elisp replacement pattern.

e.g. following should more or less you're looking for, provided file using spaces alignment (you can use untabify remove tabs if not), , lines same length (i.e. trailing spaces needed on lines if final column of varying length).

c-m-% \([0-9]+\)\([[:space:]]+\) ret \,(format (concat "%" (number-to-string (1- (length \&))) "d ") (string-to-number \1)) ret