Is this a useless use of `cat`?

Question

I can't figure out how to make the following work without using cat. I'm not worried about the forked process or anything, it just unsettles me:

$ printf "<format specification string>" $(cat source-file.txt)

Is there a better way?

Answer 1

Yes. You can accomplish the same thing, without creating a new process for cat, with:

$ printf "<format specification string>" $(<source-file.txt)