#### 23.1.4 Commands for Controlled Output ¶

During the execution of a command file or a user-defined command, normal GDB output is suppressed; the only output that appears is what is explicitly printed by the commands in the definition. This section describes three commands useful for generating exactly the output you want.

`echo text` ¶

  Print text. Nonprinting characters can be included in text using C escape sequences, such as ‘`\n`’ to print a newline. No newline is printed unless you specify one. In addition to the standard C escape sequences, a backslash followed by a space stands for a space. This is useful for displaying a string with spaces at the beginning or the end, since leading and trailing spaces are otherwise trimmed from all arguments. To print ‘`and foo =` ’, use the command ‘`echo \ and foo = \` ’.

  A backslash at the end of text can be used, as in C, to continue the command onto subsequent lines. For example,

      echo This is some text\n\
      which is continued\n\
      onto several lines.\n

  produces the same output as

      echo This is some text\n
      echo which is continued\n
      echo onto several lines.\n

`output expression` ¶

  Print the value of expression and nothing but that value: no newlines, no ‘`$nn =` ’. The value is not entered in the value history either. See Expressions, for more information on expressions.

`output/fmt expression`

  Print the value of expression in format fmt. You can use the same formats as for `print`. See Output Formats, for more information.

`printf template, expressions…` ¶

  Print the values of one or more expressions under the control of the string template. To print several values, make expressions be a comma-separated list of individual expressions, which may be either numbers or pointers. Their values are printed as specified by template, exactly as a C program would do by executing the code below:

      printf (template, expressions...);

  As in `C` `printf`, ordinary characters in template are printed verbatim, while conversion specification introduced by the ‘`%`’ character cause subsequent expressions to be evaluated, their values converted and formatted according to type and style information encoded in the conversion specifications, and then printed.

  For example, you can print two values in hex like this:

      printf "foo, bar-foo = 0x%x, 0x%x\n", foo, bar-foo

  `printf` supports all the standard `C` conversion specifications, including the flags and modifiers between the ‘`%`’ character and the conversion letter, with the following exceptions:

  - The argument-ordering modifiers, such as ‘`2$`’, are not supported.
  - The modifier ‘`*`’ is not supported for specifying precision or width.
  - The ‘`'`’ flag (for separation of digits into groups according to `LC_NUMERIC'`) is not supported.
  - The type modifiers ‘`hh`’, ‘`j`’, ‘`t`’, and ‘`z`’ are not supported.
  - The conversion letter ‘`n`’ (as in ‘`%n`’) is not supported.
  - The conversion letters ‘`a`’ and ‘`A`’ are not supported.

  Note that the ‘`ll`’ type modifier is supported only if the underlying `C` implementation used to build GDB supports the `long long int` type, and the ‘`L`’ type modifier is supported only if `long double` type is available.

  As in `C`, `printf` supports simple backslash-escape sequences, such as `\n`, ‘`\t`’, ‘`\\`’, ‘`\"`’, ‘`\a`’, and ‘`\f`’, that consist of backslash followed by a single character. Octal and hexadecimal escape sequences are not supported.

  Additionally, `printf` supports conversion specifications for DFP (Decimal Floating Point) types using the following length modifiers together with a floating point specifier. letters:

  - ‘`H`’ for printing `Decimal32` types.
  - ‘`D`’ for printing `Decimal64` types.
  - ‘`DD`’ for printing `Decimal128` types.

  If the underlying `C` implementation used to build GDB has support for the three length modifiers for DFP types, other modifiers such as width and precision will also be available for GDB to use.

  In case there is no such `C` support, no additional modifiers will be available and the value will be printed in the standard way.

  Here’s an example of printing DFP types using the above conversion letters:

      printf "D32: %Hf - D64: %Df - D128: %DDf\n",1.2345df,1.2E10dd,1.2E1dl

  Additionally, `printf` supports a special ‘`%V`’ output format. This format prints the string representation of an expression just as GDB would produce with the standard `print` command (see Examining Data):

      (gdb) print array
      $1 = {0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5}
      (gdb) printf "Array is: %V\n", array
      Array is: {0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5}

  It is possible to include print options with the ‘`%V`’ format by placing them in ‘`[...]`’ immediately after the ‘`%V`’, like this:

      (gdb) printf "Array is: %V[-array-indexes on]\n", array
      Array is: {[0] = 0, [1] = 1, [2] = 2, [3] = 3, [4] = 4, [5] = 5}

  If you need to print a literal ‘`[`’ directly after a ‘`%V`’, then just include an empty print options list:

      (gdb) printf "Array is: %V[][Hello]\n", array
      Array is: {0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5}[Hello]

`eval template, expressions…` ¶

  Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control of the string template to a command line, and call it.