printf format [ arg ... ]
       Print the arguments according to the format  speci-
       fication.  Formatting rules are the same as used in
       C. The same escape sequences as for echo are recog-
       nised  in  the  format. All C conversion specifica-
       tions ending in one of csdiouxXeEfgGn are  handled.
       In  addition  to  this, `%b' can be used instead of
       `%s' to cause escape sequences in the  argument  to
       be  recognised  and  `%q'  can be used to quote the
       argument in such a way that allows it to be  reused
       as shell input. With the numeric format specifiers,
       if the corresponding argument starts with  a  quote
       character, the numeric value of the following char-
       acter is used as the number to print otherwise  the
       argument  is evaluated as an arithmetic expression.
       See  the  section  `Arithmetic  Evaluation'  for  a
       description  of  arithmetic expressions. With `%n',
       the corresponding argument is taken as  an  identi-
       fier which is created as an integer parameter.

       Normally,  conversion specifications are applied to
       each argument in  order  but  they  can  explicitly
       specify the nth argument is to be used by replacing
       `%' by `%n$' and `*' by `*n$'.  It  is  recommended
       that  you  do  not  mix references of this explicit
       style with the normal style  and  the  handling  of
       such  mixed styles may be subject to future change.

       If arguments remain unused  after  formatting,  the
       format  string  is  reused until all arguments have
       been consumed. With the print builtin, this can  be
       suppressed  by  using  the -r option. If more argu-
       ments are required by the  format  than  have  been
       specified,  the behaviour is as if zero or an empty
       string had been specified as the argument.
