bug#16782: Insensitive behavior in date when given invalid fomatting string

[Assaf Gordon]

severity 16782 wishlist
retitle 16782 date: reject invalid %[X] format characters
stop

(triaging old bugs)

Hello,

On 17/02/14 10:42 AM, address@hidden wrote:
> Consider the following set of date invocations:
>
>      $ date +%05
>      00%05
>      $ date +%Y%#05
>      20140%#05
>      $ date +x%7
>      x     %7
>      $ date "+%7 xyz"
>          %7 xyz
>      $ date "+%7q xyz"
>          %7q xyz
>
> GNU date behaves strangely when given an invalid formatting string. GNU date
> does not inform the user about the invalid formatting string; instead it outputs
> padding as if the flags and field-width

It seems your message was never replied to. Sorry about that.

Indeed, this would be a nice improvement, contrast:

  $ printf "+%7 xyz"
  -bash: printf: ` ': invalid format character

  $ /src/printf "+%7 xyz"
  +./src/printf: %7 : invalid conversion specification

  $ ./src/printf "+%7q xyz"
  +./src/printf: %7q: invalid conversion specification

Marking this as a "wishlist" item.

-assaf