[PIG-3939] SPRINTF function to format strings using a printf-style template

• Type: New Feature
• Status: Closed
• Priority: Major
• Resolution: Fixed
• Fix Version/s: 0.14.0
• Component/s: impl, internal-udfs
• Labels: builtin formatted function string udf

Release Note

The SPRINTF function formats strings with printf-style templates: SPRINTF('%6s|%-8s|%2$,10d %2$8x %3$1TFT%<tT%<tz', 'yay', 1234567, ToMilliSeconds(CurrentTime())) => ' yay|1234567 | 1,234,567 12d687 2014-05-15T08:22:26-0500'.

• Assignee: Flip Kromer
• Reporter: Flip Kromer
• Created: 15/May/14 13:28
• Updated: 21/Nov/14 05:59
• Resolved: 07/Jun/14 23:44

Description

Pig should provide a function to format output using java.util.Formatter (printf-style) templates.

SPRINTF(
    '%6s|%-8s|%2$,10d %2$8x %3$1TFT%<tT%<tz', 
    'yay', 1234567, ToMilliSeconds(CurrentTime()))
--  '   yay|1234567 | 1,234,567   12d687 2014-05-15T08:22:26-0500'

I've written a UDF implementing SPRINTF(...), a variable-arguments function that accepts a string and any number of objects and returns a string. It counts on the java.util.Formatter to do its type-conversion, which works quite well. It doesn't appreciates pig's Dates for datetime formats ('%t'), but is quite happy to use epoch milliseconds for these as shown above.

Patch forthcoming.