PFMT(1)             RISC/os Reference Manual              PFMT(1)



NAME
     pfmt - display error message in standard format

SYNOPSIS
     pfmt
     [-llabel] [-sseverity]
     [-gcatalog:msgid] format [args]

DESCRIPTION
     pfmt uses format for printf style formatting of args.  If
     the -g option is specified, pfmt retrieves a localized ver-
     sion of the format string from a locale-specific message
     database.  The output is displayed on stderr.

     pfmt encapsulates the output in the standard error message
     format.  The -llabel option specifies the label string to be
     displayed with the message (e.g. "UX:cat").  label is a
     character string no more than 25 characters in length; it
     will be automatically suffixed with a colon (:).  When
     unspecified, no label is displayed as part of the message.

     The -sseverity option specifies the severity string to be
     displayed with the message.  Acceptable strings include the
     standard severities in either their print string (i.e. HALT,
     ERROR, INFO, WARNING, and "TO FIX") or keyword (i.e. halt,
     error, info, warn, and action) forms, or any other user-
     defined string.  A user-defined string will be assigned the
     integer severity value of 5.  The severity will be suffixed
     with a colon (:).  The ERROR severity will be used if no
     severity is specified.

     The -gcatalog:msgnum option specifies that a localized ver-
     sion of the format should be retrieved from a message data-
     base.  catalog is used to indicate the message database that
     contains the localized version of the format string.  cata-
     log must be limited to 14 characters.  These characters must
     be selected from a set of all characters values, excluding
     \0 (null) and the ASCII codes for / (slash) and : (colon).

     msgnum is a positive number that indicates the index of the
     string into the message database.

     If the catalog does not exist in the current locale (identi-
     fied by the LC_MESSAGES or LANG environment variables), or
     if the message number is out of bound, pfmt will attempt to
     retrieve the message from the C locale.  If this second
     retrieval fails, pfmt uses the format string as passed on
     the command line.

     pfmt will output Message not found!!\n as format string if
     catalog is not a valid catalog name, or if msgnum is not a
     valid number.



                        Printed 11/19/92                   Page 1

PFMT(1)             RISC/os Reference Manual              PFMT(1)



STANDARD ERROR MESSAGE FORMAT
     pfmt displays error messages in the following format:
          label: severity: text

     If no label was defined using the -llabel option, the mes-
     sage is displayed in the format:
          severity: text

     If pfmt is called twice to display an error message and a
     helpful action or recovery message, the output can look
     like:
          label: severity: text
          label: TO FIX: text

ERRORS
     Upon success, pfmt exits with code 0.  Upon failure, pfmt
     exits with the following codes:

     1    write error.

     3    syntax error.

EXAMPLE
          pfmt -l UX:test -s error "Syntax error\n"

     displays the message:
          UX:test: ERROR: Syntax error

SEE ALSO
     gettxt(1), lfmt(1), printf(1).
     pfmt(3C), environ(5) in the Programmer's Reference Manual.
























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