Re: printf(1) does not support argument swapping

[Eric Blake]

Eric Blake <ebb9 <at> byu.net> writes:

> Thanks for the report.  POSIX does not require printf(1) to support
> argument swapping:
> http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/utilities/printf.html
> 
> So this is technically not a bug.  However, if you would like to submit a
> patch that adds this as an extension, we will probably consider it for
> coreutils' printf.  If you want the bash builtin to also make this
> improvement, then bring that to the attention of the bug-bash list.

It looks like zsh already supports this extension, so there is prior art, which 
makes it all the more justifiable to add this to coreutils:

$ zsh -c 'printf %1\$s hi'
hi

-- 
Eric Blake