Stack smashing detected in C - why does this happen? - arrays

I have the following function, which, given a string, should find the most recurrent couple of letters in it and store the result in a different string.
For example - for the string "ababa", the most recurrent couple would be "ba", and for "excxexd" it would be "ex". This is the code:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <stdbool.h>
#include <string.h>
void printError(){
printf("Error: please check your input\n");
}
bool isLexicographicallyPreceding(char couple1[], char couple2[])
{
if (strcmp(couple1, couple2)>=0) return true;
return false;
}
void coupleDetector(int length, char word[], char result[])
{
char couples[length-1][2];
for (int i=0; i<length-1; i++)
{
char couple[2] = {word[i], word[i+1]};
strcpy(couples[i], couple);
}
char element[]="";
int count=0;
for (int j=0; j<length-1; j++)
{
char tempElement[2];
strcpy(tempElement,couples[j]);
int tempCount=0;
for (int p=0; p<length-1; p++)
{
if (couples[p]==tempElement) tempCount++;
}
if (tempCount>count)
{
strcpy(element, tempElement);
count=tempCount;
}
if (tempCount==count)
{
if (isLexicographicallyPreceding(tempElement,element) == true) strcpy(element, tempElement);
}
}
strcpy(result,element);
}
int main() {
//Supposed to print "ba" but instead presents "stack smashing detected".
int length=5;
char arr[] = "ababa";
char mostCommonCouple[2];
coupleDetector(length,arr,mostCommonCouple);
printf("%s", mostCommonCouple);
return 0;
}
The code compiles without errors, but for some reason does not work as intended but prints out "stack smashing detected". Why would that be? Advices would be very helpful.
Thanks.

In trying out your program, I found a few of your character arrays undersized. Character arrays (strings) need to be sized large enough to also include the null terminator value in the array. So in many locations, having a two-character array size is not sufficient and was the cause of the stack smashing. With that in mind, following is a refactored version of your program.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <stdbool.h>
#include <string.h>
void printError()
{
printf("Error: please check your input\n");
}
bool isLexicographicallyPreceding(char couple1[], char couple2[])
{
if (strcmp(couple1, couple2)>=0) return true;
return false;
}
void coupleDetector(int length, char word[], char result[])
{
char couples[length-1][3];
for (int i=0; i<length-1; i++)
{
char couple[3] = {word[i], word[i+1], '\0'};
strcpy(couples[i], couple);
}
char element[3]; /* Define the character array */
strcpy(element, ""); /* Then initialize it if need be */
int count=0;
for (int j=0; j<length-1; j++)
{
char tempElement[3];
strcpy(tempElement,couples[j]);
int tempCount=0;
for (int p=0; p<length-1; p++)
{
if (couples[p]==tempElement) tempCount++;
}
if (tempCount>count)
{
strcpy(element, tempElement);
count=tempCount;
}
if (tempCount==count)
{
if (isLexicographicallyPreceding(tempElement,element)) strcpy(element, tempElement);
}
}
strcpy(result,element);
}
int main()
{
//Supposed to print "ba" but instead presents "stack smashing detected".
int length=5;
char arr[] = "ababa";
char mostCommonCouple[3]; /* Notice size requirement to also contain the '\0' terminator */
coupleDetector(length,arr,mostCommonCouple);
printf("%s\n", mostCommonCouple);
return 0;
}
Here are some key points.
Viewing the code, most sizes for arrays was enlarged by one to accommodate storage of the null terminator.
Work fields such as "element" need to be defined to their proper size so that subsequent usage won't also result in stack smashing.
Testing out the refactored code resulted in the following terminal output.
#Vera:~/C_Programs/Console/Recurrent/bin/Release$ ./Recurrent
ba
So to reiterate, be cognizant that character arrays normally need to be defined to be large enough to contain the largest expected string plus one for the null terminator.
Give that a try and see if it meets the spirit of your project.

Related

Cannot make function read Double array

So i have a piece of code where i want to store 5 random names no longer than 10 letters each
void printname(char *s);
int main() {
char NAME[10][5];
int NAMECOUNTER=0;
while(NAMECOUNTER<5) {
scanf("%s",NAME[NAMECOUNTER]);
printname(&NAME[NAMECOUNTER]);
NAMECOUNTER++;
}
}
void printname(char *s) {
printf("Hello %s\n",*s);
return;
}
And lets say i want the name to print itself through function Printname. Why does this not work and prints "Hello (null)"?
One problem I see
char NAME[10][5];
Should be
char NAME[5][11];
This way you're declaring 5 name slots, each with 10 char max. The extra space is for the string null terminator.
You have
void printname(char *s) {
printf("Hello %s\n",*s);
return;
}
and you need
void printname(char *s) {
printf("Hello %s\n",s); // Took off the * from the *s
return;
}
because s is already your pointer.
I give 6 glitches to fix. See comments prefacing #<num>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
void printname(char *s);
int main() {
char NAME[5][11] = {0}; // #1 value initialize to zero
// #2 the second dimension should be 11, since 10 letters plus null-character
int NAMECOUNTER=0;
while(NAMECOUNTER<5) {
scanf("%10s",NAME[NAMECOUNTER]); // #3 %10s width specifier, limit the length of name up to 10 character long
while ( (ret = getchar()) != '\n') ; // #4 trim exceeding characters
printname(NAME[NAMECOUNTER]); // #5 no &
NAMECOUNTER++;
}
}
void printname(char *s) {
printf("Hello %s\n",s); // #6 no *
return;
}
Your code doesn't even print anything to me, it just freeze and closes. Also it's not so clear.
You are mistyping the "NAME" array inside printname. This function does not have a return value, since it has a void return, so you shouldn't type any return. Also you can save some code lines writing it before main function which is the best practice:
void printname(){
//todo
}
int main(){
return 0;
}
This is a better way to implement your function:
void printname(char Names[5][11], int index){
printf("Hello %s\n", Name[index]);
}
You could replace the while structure with for structure, since it is the best application for the purpose in that case:
Your code piece:
while(NAMECOUNTER<5) {
scanf("%s",NAME[NAMECOUNTER]);
printname(&NAME[NAMECOUNTER]);
NAMECOUNTER++;
}
You don't have to put "&" in the first argument of printname.
Best:
for(NameCounter = 0; NameCounter < 5; NameCounter++){
scanf("%s",NAME[NAMECOUNTER]);
printname(NAME[NAMECOUNTER]);
}
Also make sure to keep your code indentation clear. This is your final code:
void printname(char Names[][11], int index){
printf("Hello %s\n", Names[index]);
}
int main(){
char NAME[5][11];
int NAMECOUNTER;;
for(NAMECOUNTER = 0; NAMECOUNTER < 5; NAMECOUNTER++){
scanf("%s", NAME[NAMECOUNTER]);
printname(NAME, NAMECOUNTER);
}
}

search of string in an array of strings

i wrote some code that is supposed to find the location of a given string in an array of strings.
problem is- it doesn't give the location. it gives something else.
i understand that probably the problem has to do with the differences between the pointers that are involved- a previous version that dealt with finding the position of a letter in a word worked well.
after a lot of attempts to figure out where is the bug, i ask your help.
kindly, explain me what should be done.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int what (char * token);
main()
{
int i=0;
char string[]="jsr";
char *token;
token=&string[0];
i=what(token);
printf(" location of input is %d \n", i);
return 0;
}
int what (char * token)
{
int i=1;
char *typtbl[]={"mov",
"cmp",
"add",
"sub",
"not",
"clr",
"lea",
};
char * ptr;
ptr=(char *)typtbl;
while (!(strcmp(ptr,token)==0))
{
ptr=(char *)(typtbl+i);
i++;
}
return i;
}
As pointed out, you did not design function what properly. What value should it return if your search function go through all the pointers but does not find the desired string? Typically in that case return -1 would be a choice to indicate nothing found. Also in this case, using a for loop would probably be more suitable, you can just return the index immediately instead of going through all pointers.
int what(char *token)
{
char *typtbl[] = {
"mov",
"cmp",
"add",
"sub",
"not",
"clr",
"lea",
};
for( size_t i = 0; i < sizeof(typtbl)/sizeof(char*); ++i )
{
char *ptr = typtbl[i];
if(strcmp(ptr, token) == 0)
{
return i; // found something
}
}
return -1; // found nothing
}
A cleaner working version.
Main issue is in the (char *)(typtbl+i) replaced by typtbl[i] in the following code. typtbl+i is equivalent to &typtbl[i], so if my memory is good, it's a pointer on the pointer of the string and not the pointer of string itself
I added a NULL at the end of the array to be able to stop if the string is not present and return -1 to clearly say it was not found.
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
int what(char *token);
int main()
{
int i = 0;
char string[] = "jsr";
i = what(string);
printf(" location of input is %d \n", i);
return 0;
}
int what(char *token)
{
char *typtbl[] = {
"mov",
"cmp",
"add",
"jsr",
"not",
"clr",
"lea",
NULL
};
int i = 0;
while(typtbl[i] && !(strcmp(typtbl[i], token) == 0)) {
++i;
}
if(!typtbl[i])
i = -1;
return i;
}
char *token; token=&string[0]; was useless because string == &string[0].
A few things:
Your main function is missing its return type.
The while loop in what doesn't stop when the element isn't found. Therefore you are reading out of bounds.
This should do the work w/o pointer arithmetic.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int what (char * token);
int main(){
int i=0;
char string[]="jsr";
char *token;
token=&string[0];
i=what(token);
printf(" location of input is %d \n", i);
return 0;
}
int what (char * token){
unsigned int i=0;
char *typtbl[]={"mov",
"cmp",
"add",
"sub",
"not",
"clr",
"lea",
};
unsigned int typtbl_x_size = sizeof(typtbl)/sizeof(typtbl[0]);
char * ptr;
ptr=typtbl[i];
while (!(strcmp(ptr,token)==0)){
i += 1;
if (i >= typtbl_x_size){
printf("element not in list\n");
return -1;
}
ptr=typtbl[i];
}
return i;
}

Error with the array returning through function

I need to read a word from main function and convert the characters in UCASE if the first character is LCASE and vice versa using the user defined function.I tried ways for returning the array from function but still I am lacking some core ideas. Please debug this program and explain the way it works.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
int* low (char str)
{
int i;
for (i=1; i<strlen(str);i++)
{
if(str[i]<91)
{
str[i]=str[i]+32;
}
else
{
}
}
return &str;
}
int* high (char str[50])
{
int i;
for (i=0; i<strlen(str);i++)
{
if(str[i]>91)
{
str[i]=str[i]-32;
}
else
{
}
}
return &str;
}
void main()
{
char str[50];
char* strl;
printf("Enter any string....\n");
scanf("%s",str);
if (str[0]<91)
{
*strl=low(str);
}
else
{
*strl=high(str);
}
printf("Converted string is %s.",*strl);
}
There is already a problem here:
So if you are saying this code is perfect and you want us to debug it and explain how (on earth) this works, then here you go.
In function int* low (char str), you have if(str[i]<91). Thats a problem right there. str is a char received as an argument, and hence str[i] is a straight compile-time error.
Another one to deal with is the return statement.
You have a statement:
return &str;
which would return the address of str, which by the way is a char, whereas function low is supposed to return a pointer to an int.
The same is applicable to high function as well.
Suggestion: Leave aside this bad code and get a beginner level C programming book first. Read it and the try some codes out of it.
A few inputs for improvement: (Which you may not comprehend)
change
void main()
to
int main(void)
Why? Refer this legendary post: What should main() return in C and C++?
Secondly, int both functions you are using strlen() in loop which will always return a fixed value. So, instead of
for (i=0; i<strlen(str);i++)
I'd suggest,
size_t strlength = strlen(str);
for (i=0; i < strlength; i++)
You can try the code and method as below:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
char* caseConverter (char *str)
{
int i;
for (i=0; i<strlen(str);i++)
{
if(str[i]>=65 && str[i]<=90)
{
str[i]=str[i]+32; //To lower case
}
else if((str[i]>=97 && str[i]<=122))
{
str[i]=str[i]-32; //To upper case
}
else
printf("%c is not an alphabet \n",str[i]);
}
return str;
}
void main()
{
char inputStr[50]= "Stubborn";
char* opStr= caseConverter(inputStr);
printf("Converted string is %s",opStr);
}

parsing a string into tokens without strtok/lexer

I want to parse a string into an array of tokens . '\n' and ';' are delimiters , for e.g. :
hello;hello
world
should be converted to an array containing: {"hello","hello","world"}.
I tried many different methods for doing this and always I fail (since it needs a dynamic array of char * I have trouble with implementing it).
Please note that I cannot use strtok or lexical analyzer.
How may I do this ? Any points ?
EDIT : here is one of methods I tried to use but I get segmentation fault (maybe a memory access issue somewhere in my code) :
#include <stdio.h>
#include <malloc.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <string.h>
typedef struct {
int fd;
char *path;
int size;
char *mem;
struct stat st;
} file;
file *readfile(char *path) {
file *a=malloc(sizeof(file));
a->path=path;
a->fd=open(a->path,O_RDONLY);
if(a->fd<0) return 0;
fstat(a->fd,&a->st);
a->size=a->st.st_size;
a->mem=malloc(a->size);
read(a->fd,a->mem,a->size);
return a;
}
void releasefile(file *a) {
free(a->mem);
close(a->fd);
free(a);
}
char **parse(int *w,file *a) {
int i,j=0;
w=0;
for(i=0;i<=a->size;i++) {
if(a->mem[i]=='\n' || a->mem[i]==';') { a->mem[i]='\0'; j++; }
}
char **out=malloc(sizeof(char *)*j);
for(i=0;i<=a->size;i++) {
if(a->mem[i-1]!='\0') continue;
out[*w]=malloc(strlen(a->mem+i)+1);
memcpy(out[*w],a->mem+i,strlen(a->mem+i)+1);
w++;
return out;
}
int main(int argc,char **argv) {
file *a=readfile(argv[1]);
int *w=malloc(sizeof(int));
char **tokens=parse(w,a);
int i;
for(i=0;i<=*w;i++) {
puts(tokens[i]);
}
releasefile(a);
// ATM no need to check for mem leaks :)
}
Algorithm description : read file, put \0 where you see a delimiter, start and push tokens seprated by \0 into an array.
What has happened to computer science?
Anyway write a FSA - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finite-state_machine
Can do this using a table

Struggling with strings. What is wrong with my function?

I am trying to write a small function to trim left spaces from a string, but I cannot get it right. In this version, I get the following error:
bus error: 10
Could anyone please explain to me what I am doing wrong? I am not looking so much for an alternative piece of code, but would like to understand the errors in my code:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <ctype.h>
void trim_string(char *);
int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
char *temp = " I struggle with strings in C.\n";
trim_string(temp);
printf("%s", temp);
return 0;
}
void trim_string(char *string) {
char *string_trimmed = "";
int i=0, j=0;
while (isblank(string[i])) {
i++;
}
while (string[i] != '\0') {
string_trimmed[j] = string[i];
i++;
j++;
}
string_trimmed[j] = '\0';
strcpy(string, string_trimmed);
}
I have now found a workaround solution, shown below. But I am still not very clear about what I did wrong in the first place:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <ctype.h>
#define MAX_LENGTH 100
void trim_string(char [MAX_LENGTH]);
int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
char temp[MAX_LENGTH] = " I struggle with strings in C.\n";
trim_string(temp);
printf("%s", temp);
return 0;
}
void trim_string(char string[MAX_LENGTH]) {
char string_trimmed[MAX_LENGTH];
int i=0, j=0;
while (isblank(string[i])) {
i++;
}
while (string[i] != '\0') {
string_trimmed[j] = string[i];
i++;
j++;
}
string_trimmed[j] = '\0';
printf("c\n");
strcpy(string, string_trimmed);
}
Both string and string_trimmed point to string literals, here in main:
char *temp = " I struggle with strings in C.\n";
^
|
This is a string literal
temp points to a string literal and the standard says you are not allowed to modify them.
In the function trim_string you are modifying a them which is undefined behavior of which a bus error is one possible result, although anything can happen.
string_trimmed either needs to be an array like this:
char string_trimmed[n] ;
where n is the size of your input using strlen(string) would probably make sense or dynamically allocated via malloc which you would need to free at the end of your function. The same things goes for your input from main, this would work as a substitute:
char temp[] = " I struggle with strings in C.\n";
For completeness sake, the draft C99 standard section 6.4.5 String literals paragraph 6 says (emphasis mine):
It is unspecified whether these arrays are distinct provided their elements have the
appropriate values. If the program attempts to modify such an array, the behavior is
undefined.

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