
      nb="${1}"
      shift
      msg="${1}"
      bs="`echo ' ' | tr ' ' '\010'`"
      awk '
      END{
         chars=""
         nb = int( nb )
         while ( i++ < nb ) chars = chars bs
         chars = chars msg
         i = j = length( msg )
         while ( i++ < nb ) chars = chars " "
         while ( j++ < nb ) chars = chars bs
         printf( "%s", chars ) >"/dev/tty"
         print( length( msg ) )
      }' nb="${nb}" msg="${msg}" bs="${bs}" /dev/null
