From: Kevin Brown <blargity@...>
Date: 2005-12-15T08:22:56+09:00
Subject: Re: convert seconds to hours:minutes:seconds

On Wednesday 14 December 2005 16:19, Andy Delcambre wrote:
> What is wrong with printf, I learned C first and most recently have
> done a lot of programming with python which includes printf style
> variable interpolation. It is my favorite way of formatting output as
> it is what I know.  Does god kill a kitten out of personal preference
> or some deep seated problem with printf in ruby?

C/C++ programmers are comfortable with printf.  If someone overloaded the % 
operator and started using that in C++, you'd get annoyed.  It's not 
something that's a widely used portion of the language.  So if anyone else 
ever has to read your code, you're asking them to approach it from the C 
point of view instead of the Ruby point of view.  Being that the common 
denominator is that they'll know Ruby, this is inconsiderate.

Can you do it?  Sure.  But Ruby programmers, as a rule, do not think about 
string processing this way.  At least save yourself some keystrokes and use 
the exact same format string and % if you must.

>  - Andy Delcambre

[*snip*]