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From: kjb@zycad.UUCP (Kevin Buchs)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: printf and variable length string format (asterisk)
Message-ID: <692@zycad.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 22-Nov-87 10:35:27 EST
Article-I.D.: zycad.692
Posted: Sun Nov 22 10:35:27 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 25-Nov-87 20:43:01 EST
Organization: ZYCAD, Oakdale, MN
Lines: 30


I want to print out a string whose length I will not know ahead, and which
is not null terminated.  I thought the following use of the asterisk
precision delimiter would work:
	
char *a = "hello"; int i;
for (i=0; i<6; i++) printf("%*s\n", i, a);

I thought it would print:

h
he
hel
hell
hello

but I got:

hello
hello
hello
hello
hello

Does the asterisk not work with the s descriptor?  Or, am I using it wrong.
Is there another way to do this (except fwrite)?

-- 
Kevin Buchs   3500 Zycad Dr. Oakdale, MN 55109  (612)779-5548
Zycad Corp.   {rutgers,ihnp4,amdahl,umn-cs}!meccts!nis!zycad!kjb