Tabtekens

Tabtekens, or tab characters, are control characters used in computing to move the cursor to the next tab stop. In ASCII and Unicode, the tab is represented by the code point U+0009 (horizontal tab). In text display, a tab is usually shown as a fixed width space that advances to the next tab stop.

Common tab stops are set every eight columns, but many editors let users configure tab width to 4, 2, or other values. Tabs are used both in plain text to format output and in data formats to separate fields (tab-delimited files). In many programming languages, the escape sequence \t inserts a tab within a string.

Rendering and storage vary: some environments store a real tab character as a single byte, others replace it with multiple spaces when displaying. Mixing tabs and spaces for alignment can lead to misalignment across editors and platforms.

Practical guidance: for portable data formats, tab-delimited text is common but less supported than CSV today; when alignment is needed, using spaces or explicit formatting is often preferred. If using tabs, ensure consistent tab width and encoding, and beware that editors may not share the same defaults.

Tabs are distinct from other whitespace characters; they are different from regular spaces and vertical tabs.