On Saturday 10 May 2008 17:15, Arthur Hagen wrote:

> As for printf, you do NOT want to use that if compatibility is a main
> concern. You might as well require bash or ksh then, cause you will be
> incompatible with lots of older systems (including many legacy[1]
> commercial unixes) which lack printf.

I was speaking of posix systems, which imho is the only reasonable reference
when speaking of "compatibility" or "portability" when no additional
information is known. And, as you pointed out, "echo" does not have less
problems either. Its advantage is that it's more likely to be present in
legacy systems, you are right on this.

Anyway, the OP has no such problems, since he's using a Gentoo system.

> [1]: With "legacy" meaning "something that works", and thus won't get
> upgraded or replaced unless it's absolutely necessary. Lack of "printf"
> won't make an IT manager pay big bucks to upgrade and risk an important
> working system getting serious downtime.

Ah well, I surely agree with this, but that cannot be guessed by just
reading a message in a newsgroup :-)
As I said before, lacking other information, I tend to suggest using more
posix-standardized features. Nonetheless, I agree that in most cases you
can be correct.

Regards