PMSPRINTF(3)

💖 PMSPRINTF 💖

okay bestie, so this one is pmsprintf from the PCP crew — it lives in section 3 of the manual (that's the library functions girlies, iykyk), and it is literally the safe-girl version of formatting a string. no cap.

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✨ NAME ✨

pmsprintf — formatted string conversion 🎀

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🌸 C SYNOPSIS 🌸

first you gotta pull in the header, periodt:

#include <pcp/pmapi.h>

and here's the signature, exactly as it is, no edits:

int pmsprintf(char *str, size_t size, const char *fmt, ... /*args*/);

then when you build, you link it like this:

cc ... -lpcp

🫶 that's it. that's the whole vibe.

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so pmsprintf is a safe string formatting interface that wraps the vsnprintf(3) call. it's giving responsible older sister energy honestly.

the main character difference? pmsprintf guarantees that your output buffer str is gonna be null-terminated — even when the buffer size you handed it is insufficient to hold the whole formatted string. 💅 like, it simply will not leave you hanging with an unterminated mess. in that case, a null-terminated truncated string gets returned in str. truncated but terminated. cute and safe. ✨

and if the underlying vsnprintf interface itself fails? 😭 then str gets a null-terminated empty string dropped into it, and the return value is zero. no drama, no garbage, just an empty little string and a 0.

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👑 DIAGNOSTICS 👑

when it succeeds, pmsprintf returns the number of characters written to the supplied buffer — and not counting the null terminator, bestie, don't forget that part.

and the return code is always zero or more, never negative. 😌 zero is the floor. we do not go below it. periodt.

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🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• vsnprintf(3)
• pmprintf(3)
• PMAPI(3)

go read those too, they're all in the group chat together. 🫶

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and that's the whole page, babe — brought to you by Performance Co-Pilot (that's the PCP girlies ✨), PMSPRINTF(3), 💖 mwah 💖