Toolbox theme using printif statement – help needed understanding code block

The % signs are arguments in the string to be formatted. The s represents a string type argument must be passed. I’ve notated which arguments are connected to which strings being passed in.

get_permalink() - %1 string type
get_the_date( 'c' ) - %2 string type
get_the_date() - %3 string type
get_author_posts_url( get_the_author_meta( 'ID' ) ) %4 string type
sprintf( esc_attr(__( 'View all posts by %s', 'toolbox' ), get_the_author() ) %5 string type (Also %s refers to get_the_author())
get_the_author() - %6 string type

For more information see: http://php.net/manual/en/function.printf.php