printf command inside a script returns “invalid number”

Question

I can\'t get printf to print a variable with the %e descriptor in a bash script. It would just say

#!/bin/bash
a=14.9
printf %e 14.9;
         


        

Answer 1

I bumped into this error and found this page. In my case, it was 100% pilot error.

month=2
printf "%02d" month

it should be

printf "%02d" "${month}"

or more simply

printf "%02d" $month