std::string formatting like sprintf

Question

I have to format std::string with sprintf and send it into file stream. How can I do this?

Answer 1

If you are on a system that has asprintf(3), you can easily wrap it:

#include 
#include 
#include 

std::string format(const char *fmt, ...) __attribute__ ((format (printf, 1, 2)));

std::string format(const char *fmt, ...)
{
    std::string result;

    va_list ap;
    va_start(ap, fmt);

    char *tmp = 0;
    int res = vasprintf(&tmp, fmt, ap);
    va_end(ap);

    if (res != -1) {
        result = tmp;
        free(tmp);
    } else {
        // The vasprintf call failed, either do nothing and
        // fall through (will return empty string) or
        // throw an exception, if your code uses those
    }

    return result;
}

int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
    std::string username = "you";
    std::cout << format("Hello %s! %d", username.c_str(), 123) << std::endl;
    return 0;
}