printf(3S) INTERACTIVE UNIX System printf(3S)
NAME
printf, fprintf, sprintf - print formatted output
SYNOPSIS
#include <stdio.h>
int printf (format , arg ... )
char *format;
int fprintf (stream, format , arg ... )
FILE *stream;
char *format;
int sprintf (s, format [ , arg ] ... )
char *s, *format;
DESCRIPTION
The printf function places output on the standard output
stream stdout. The fprintf function places output on the
named output stream. The sprintf function places ``out-
put,'' followed by the null character (\0), in consecutive
bytes starting at *s; it is the user's responsibility to
ensure that enough storage is available. Each function
returns the number of characters transmitted (not including
the \0 in the case of sprintf), or a negative value if an
output error was encountered.
Each of these functions converts, formats, and prints its
args under control of the format. The format is a character
string that contains three types of objects: plain charac-
ters, which are simply copied to the output stream; escape
sequences that represent non-graphic characters; and conver-
sion specifications, each of which results in fetching of
zero or more args. The results are undefined if there are
insufficient args for the format. If the format is
exhausted while args remain, the excess args are simply
ignored.
Each conversion specification is introduced by the character
%. After the %, the following appear in sequence:
Zero or more flags, which modify the meaning of the
conversion specification.
An optional, decimal digit string specifying a minimum
field width. If the converted value has fewer charac-
ters than the field width, it will be padded on the
left (or right, if the left-adjustment flag `-',
described below, has been given) to the field width.
The padding is with blanks unless the field width digit
string starts with a zero, in which case the padding is
with zeros.
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A precision that gives the minimum number of digits to
appear for the d, i, o, u, x, or X conversions, the
number of digits to appear after the decimal point for
the e, E, and f conversions, the maximum number of sig-
nificant digits for the g and G conversion, or the max-
imum number of characters to be printed from a string
in s conversion. The precision takes the form of a
period (.) followed by a decimal digit string; a null
digit string is treated as zero. Padding specified by
the precision overrides the padding specified by the
field width.
An optional l (ell) specifying that a following d, i,
o, u, x, or X conversion character applies to a long
integer arg. An l before any other conversion charac-
ter is ignored.
A character that indicates the type of conversion to be
applied.
A field width or precision or both may be indicated by an
asterisk (*) instead of a digit string. In this case, an
integer arg supplies the field width or precision. The arg
that is actually converted is not fetched until the conver-
sion letter is seen, so the args specifying field width or
precision must appear before the arg (if any) to be con-
verted. A negative field width argument is taken as a `-'
flag followed by a positive field width. If the precision
argument is negative, it will be changed to zero.
The flag characters and their meanings are:
- The result of the conversion will be left-
justified within the field.
+ The result of a signed conversion will always
begin with a sign (+ or -).
blank If the first character of a signed conversion is
not a sign, a blank will be prefixed to the
result. This implies that if the blank and +
flags both appear, the blank flag will be ignored.
# This flag specifies that the value is to be con-
verted to an ``alternate form.'' For c, d, i, s,
and u conversions, the flag has no effect. For o
conversion, it increases the precision to force
the first digit of the result to be a zero. For x
or X conversion, a non-zero result will have 0x or
0X prefixed to it. For e, E, f, g, and G conver-
sions, the result will always contain a decimal
point, even if no digits follow the point (nor-
mally, a decimal point appears in the result of
these conversions only if a digit follows it).
For g and G conversions, trailing zeroes will not
be removed from the result (which they normally
are).
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printf(3S) INTERACTIVE UNIX System printf(3S)
The conversion characters and their meanings are:
d,i,o,u,x,X
The integer arg is converted to signed decimal (d
or i), unsigned octal, (o), decimal (u), or hexa-
decimal notation (x or X), respectively; the
letters abcdef are used for x conversion and the
letters ABCDEF for X conversion. The precision
specifies the minimum number of digits to appear;
if the value being converted can be represented in
fewer digits, it will be expanded with leading
zeroes. The default precision is 1. The result
of converting a zero value with a precision of
zero is a null string.
f The float or double arg is converted to decimal
notation in the style ``[-]ddd.ddd,'' where the
number of digits after the decimal delimiter is
equal to the precision specification. If the pre-
cision is missing, six digits are output; if the
precision is explicitly 0, no decimal delimiter
appears.
In a POSIX environment, the appearance of the
decimal delimiter depends on the current locale
category LC_NUMERIC.
e,E The float or double arg is converted in the style
``[-]d.ddde+dd,'' where there is one digit before
the decimal point and the number of digits after
it is equal to the precision; when the precision
is missing, six digits are produced; if the preci-
sion is zero, no decimal point appears. The E
format code will produce a number with E instead
of e introducing the exponent. The exponent
always contains at least two digits.
g,G The float or double arg is printed in style f or e
(or in style E in the case of a G format code),
with the precision specifying the number of signi-
ficant digits. The style used depends on the
value converted: style e will be used only if the
exponent resulting from the conversion is less
than -4 or greater than the precision. Trailing
zeroes are removed from the result; a decimal
point appears only if it is followed by a digit.
c The character arg is printed.
s The arg is taken to be a string (character
pointer) and characters from the string are
printed until a null character (\0) is encountered
or the number of characters indicated by the pre-
cision specification is reached. If the precision
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printf(3S) INTERACTIVE UNIX System printf(3S)
is missing, it is taken to be infinite, so all
characters up to the first null character are
printed. A NULL value for arg will yield unde-
fined results.
n (POSIX Only) The argument is an int * into which
is written the number of characters printed up to
this point.
p (POSIX Only) The pointer arg is printed as a hex-
adecimal address. The arg should be cast to void
*, or to char * if an ANSI C compiler is not
available.
% Print a %; no argument is converted.
In printing floating point types (float and double), if the
exponent is 0x7FF and the mantissa is not equal to zero,
then the output is
[-]NaN0xdddddddd
where 0xdddddddd is the hexadecimal representation of the
leftmost 32 bits of the mantissa. If the mantissa is zero,
the output is
[+]inf
In no case does a nonexistent or small field width cause
truncation of a field; if the result of a conversion is
wider than the field width, the field is simply expanded to
contain the conversion result. Characters generated by
printf and fprintf are printed as if putc(3S) had been
called.
Examples
To print a date and time in the form ``Sunday, July 3,
10:02,'' where weekday and month are pointers to null-
terminated strings:
printf("%s, %s %i, %d:%.2d", weekday, month, day, hour, min);
To print pi to 5 decimal places:
printf("pi = %.5f", 4 * atan(1.0));
SEE ALSO
ecvt(3C), putc(3S), scanf(3S), _stdio(3S), locale(5P).
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