Question

Generally when we do something like:

printf ( " %.*f ", 2, 3.3 );

the precision width is being set to 2 and outputs 3.30. But what if the width is given the negative value, e.g.

printf ( " %.*f ", -2, 3.3 );

The output is 3.300000 which means the default width is being used. So what exactly is this -2 doing here ?

Answer 1

As Chris commented similarly above,

A negative precision is taken as if the precision were omitted

Here’s a reference.