Fixed Width Text File Definition: Above all, a fixed width text file is a file that has a specific format which allows for the saving of textual information/data in an organized fashion. 

Fixed width text files are special cases of text files where the format is specified by column widths, pad character and left/right alignment.  Column widths are in units of characters. So if you have data in a text file where the first column always has exactly 10 characters, and the second column has exactly 5, the third has exactly 12 (and so on), then you have a fixed width text file.

Each row (paragraph) contains one record of information; each record can contain multiple pieces of data (fields), each data field (column) has a precise number of characters.  The data is padded with spaces (or any character you specify) if it does not completely use all the characters allotted to it. Further, each piece of data can be left or right justified, meaning the padding of characters can occur on either side.

A typical Fixed Width Text file, where the first column is said to be 20 characters, 2^nd column to be 10 and third to be 12 would look something like this:

Name                State     Telephone  

John Smith          WA        Z18-Y11-4111

Mary Hartford       CA        a19-Z19-4341

Evan Nolan          IL        b19-532-c301

In the case above, the data is left justified and padded with space characters.

Tools For Conversion of Fixed Width Text Files

• Convert Fixed Width Text to XLS File
• Convert Fixed Width Text to XLSX File
• Convert Fixed Width Text File to CSV
• Convert Fixed Width Text File to HTML
• Convert Fixed Width Text File to XML
• Convert XLS to Fixed Width Text File
• Convert CSV To Fixed Width Text File
• Convert ? To a Fixed Width Text File file