%a format

[John Lenton]

On Tue, Sep 07, 2004 at 12:21:49PM -0700, Erik Max Francis wrote:
> Tor Iver Wilhelmsen wrote:
> 
> > John Lenton <john at grulic.org.ar> writes:
> > 
> > > Is there any reason python's printf-style formatting is missing the
> > > (C99) '%a' specifier?
> > 
> > Because it's not very well known or used? A google for "C printf
> > format string" gave lots of resources, none of which had %a.
> 
> It's not C99, anyway; my copy of C99 makes no mention of it (the only
> mention of %a is associated with gmtime.

hmm! weird. From printf(3):

       a,A    (C99; not in SUSv2) For a conversion, the double
              argument is converted to hexadecimal notation (using the
              letters abcdef) in the style [‐]0xh.hhhhp±d; for A
              conversion the prefix 0X, the letters ABCDEF, and the
              exponent separator P is used.  There is one hexadecimal
              digit before the decimal point, and the number of digits
              after it is equal to the precision.  The default
              precision suffices for an exact representation of the
              value if an exact representation in base 2 exists and
              otherwise is sufficiently large to distinguish values of
              type double.  The digit before the decimal point is
              unspecified for non‐normalized numbers, and nonzero but
              otherwise unspecified for normalized numbers.

and looking at ISO/IEC 9899:1999 (E), it's on page 278, §7.19.6.1:


    a,A

    A double argument representing a floating-point number is
    converted in the style [-]0xh.hhhh p±d, where there is one
    hexadecimal digit (which is nonzero if the argument is a
    normalized floating-point number and is otherwise unspecified)
    before the decimal-point character235) and the number of
    hexadecimal digits after it is equal to the precision; if the
    precision is missing and FLT_RADIX is a power of 2, then the
    precision is sufficient for an exact representation of the value;
    if the precision is missing and FLT_RADIX is not a power of 2,
    then the precision is sufficient to distinguish236) values of type
    double, except that trailing zeros may be omitted; if the
    precision is zero and the # flag is not specified, no decimalpoint
    character appears. The letters abcdef are used for a conversion
    and the letters ABCDEF for A conversion. The A conversion
    specifier produces a number with X and P instead of x and p. The
    exponent always contains at least one digit, and only as many more
    digits as necessary to represent the decimal exponent of 2. If the
    value is zero, the exponent is zero.

    A double argument representing an infinity or NaN is converted in
    the style of an f or F conversion specifier.


-- 
John Lenton (john at grulic.org.ar) -- Random fortune:
It seems intuitively obvious to me, which means that it might be wrong.
		-- Chris Torek
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