.\" DO NOT MODIFY THIS FILE!  It was generated by help2man 1.35.
.TH PRINTF "1" "December 2006" "printf 6.7" "User Commands"
.SH NAME
printf \- format and print data
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B printf
\fIFORMAT \fR[\fIARGUMENT\fR]...
.br
.B printf
\fIOPTION\fR
.SH DESCRIPTION
.\" Add any additional description here
.PP
Print ARGUMENT(s) according to FORMAT.
.TP
\fB\-\-help\fR
display this help and exit
.TP
\fB\-\-version\fR
output version information and exit
.PP
FORMAT controls the output as in C printf.  Interpreted sequences are:
.TP
\e"
double quote
.TP
\eNNN
character with octal value NNN (1 to 3 digits)
.TP
\e\e
backslash
.TP
\ea
alert (BEL)
.TP
\eb
backspace
.TP
\ec
produce no further output
.TP
\ef
form feed
.TP
\en
new line
.TP
\er
carriage return
.TP
\et
horizontal tab
.TP
\ev
vertical tab
.TP
\exHH
byte with hexadecimal value HH (1 to 2 digits)
.TP
\euHHHH
Unicode (ISO/IEC 10646) character with hex value HHHH (4 digits)
.TP
\eUHHHHHHHH
Unicode character with hex value HHHHHHHH (8 digits)
.TP
%%
a single %
.TP
%b
ARGUMENT as a string with `\e' escapes interpreted,
.IP
except that octal escapes are of the form \e0 or \e0NNN
.PP
and all C format specifications ending with one of diouxXfeEgGcs, with
ARGUMENTs converted to proper type first.  Variable widths are handled.
.PP
NOTE: your shell may have its own version of printf, which usually supersedes
the version described here.  Please refer to your shell's documentation
for details about the options it supports.
.SH AUTHOR
Written by David MacKenzie.
.SH "REPORTING BUGS"
Report bugs to <bug\-coreutils@gnu.org>.
.SH COPYRIGHT
Copyright \(co 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
.br
This is free software.  You may redistribute copies of it under the terms of
the GNU General Public License <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
.SH "SEE ALSO"
The full documentation for
.B printf
is maintained as a Texinfo manual.  If the
.B info
and
.B printf
programs are properly installed at your site, the command
.IP
.B info printf
.PP
should give you access to the complete manual.