From rjvbertin@hotmail.com  Mon Jul 15 17:41:30 2002
From: rjvbertin@hotmail.com (RenE J.V. Bertin)
Date: Mon, 15 Jul 2002 18:41:30 +0200
Subject: portable snprintf implementation
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.31.0207151544070.6237-100000@gannet.stats>
References: <20020709204930.280b5170.rjvbertin@hotmail.com>
 <Pine.LNX.4.31.0207151544070.6237-100000@gannet.stats>
Message-ID: <20020715184130.17826e0c.rjvbertin@hotmail.com>

On Mon, 15 Jul 2002 15:45:31 +0100 (BST), <ripley@stats.ox.ac.uk> wrote regarding "Re: portable
snprintf implementation"

8-) > http://www.ijs.si/software/snprintf/
8-) >
8-) > It looks like this version may well be more complete and conform the standards than the
version that comes with R.
8-) 
8-) Maybe, but what is in R does what R requires, and has been thoroughly
8-) tested.  I don't propose to do the work again!

This is of course entirely up to the judgement of the R-Core members. I can't begin to oversee what subtle formatting documented and undocumented commands R uses, nor how much work it will be to test another version for compliance with R's needs. I have tested only the standard behaviour of the version referenced above, which works, well, standardly, and compilation and using the library was a breeze (on Irix 6.2; there is a thorough test included).
It should be kept in mind however that on most systems where R runs, snprintf c.s. are available, likely in uptodate versions that conform to all or most of the approbriate standards. In other words, they evolve, as R's use of them may, and as the included version will most probably not. This was my main reason to point out the existence of an independent snprintf library that looks like it is being maintained, not some idea R's included version is not up to the task!

RenE Bertin
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portable snprintf implementation
RenE J.V. Bertin