how to read and write beyond the defined characters in fgets() function - c

I am working on a assignment:
Open a text file and print its contents in command window, ask the user to
replace the text from the text file to be written and save the text
file.
When I set the maximum character size to 256,it works but when I give 20 it doesn't. Is there a way to overcome this problem by printing the characters beyond the defined limit?
I have used fgets() function.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#define MAX 20
int main(){
FILE *fptr1, *fptr2;
int lno, linectr = 1;
char str[MAX],fname[MAX];
char newln[MAX], temp[] = "temp.txt";
printf("\n\n Replace a specific line in a text file with a new text :\n");
printf(" Input the file name to be opened : ");
fgets(fname, MAX, stdin);
fname[strlen(fname) - 1] = '\0';
fptr1 = fopen(fname, "r");
if (!fptr1)
{
printf("Unable to open the input file!!\n");
return 0;
}
fptr2 = fopen(temp, "w");
if (!fptr2)
{
printf("Unable to open a temporary file to write!!\n");
fclose(fptr1);
return 0;
}
printf(" Input the content of the new line : ");
fgets(newln, MAX, stdin);
fgets(str, MAX, stdin);
printf(" Input the line no you want to replace : ");
scanf("%d", &lno);
lno++;
while (!feof(fptr1))
{
strcpy(str, "\0");
fgets(str, MAX, fptr1);
if (!feof(fptr1))
{
linectr++;
if (linectr != lno)
{
fprintf(fptr2, "%s", str);
}
else
{
fprintf(fptr2, "%s", newln);
}
}
}
fclose(fptr1);
fclose(fptr2);
remove(fname);
rename(temp, fname);
printf(" Replacement did successfully\n");
return 0;
}

I'm assuming you are asking how to read a 100 char long line into a 20 char sized buffer.
Well, obviously the whole line does not fit into the buffer. You need to read in chunks. You know you've read the last chunk when the buffer contains a newline (or EOF is reached)...
if (!fgets(str, MAX, fptr1)) /* EOF detected */;
//let's see if we got a partial line
size_t len = strlen(str); // note: len != 0 for text files
if (str[len - 1] == '\n') {
// full line
// do the comparison or whatever
} else {
// fgets got first chunk
// read rest of line and ignore it
for (;;) {
int ch = fgetc(fptr1);
if (ch == EOF) /* EOF detected */;
if (ch == '\n') break; // full line read, ready for next one
}
}

Related

How can I copy some strings from file to another using c programming

I have this code:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int main()
{
FILE* ptr = fopen("data.txt","r");
char filename[100];
if (ptr==NULL)
{
printf("no such file.");
return 0;
}
char buf[100];
while (fscanf(ptr,"%*s %*s %s ",buf)==1)
printf("%s\n", buf);
printf("Create a file \n");
scanf("%s", filename);
fptr2 = fopen(filename, "w");
if (fptr2 == NULL)
{
printf("Cannot open file %s \n", filename);
exit(0);
}
c = fgetc(fptr1);
while (c != EOF)
{
fputc(c, fptr2);
c = fgetc(fptr1);
}
printf("\nContents copied to %s", filename);
fclose(fptr1);
fclose(fptr2);
return 0;
}
}
It coppies full content from one file to another. I need to copy only strings that have 5 as the last character (3 column)
For example Data.txt looks like that:
Alex 10B 4
John 10A 3
Kate 10C 5
In file that I will create during execution has to be coppied only Kate 10C 5 string. I've been trying for hours but I don't know how to do this. Can you help me?
In the end of each line there is a newline character, (\n) you can use that to read line by line and copy only the ones that you want:
FILE* dest = fopen("out.txt", "w+"); // supressed null check for simplicity
char buf[100];
char* char_to_find;
// parse line by line
while (fscanf(ptr, " %99[^\n]", buf) == 1){
char_to_find = buf;
// reach the end of the line
while(*char_to_find){
char_to_find++;
}
//move one back
char_to_find--;
// if it's 5 save, if not move on
if(*char_to_find == '5' && *(char_to_find - 1) == ' '){
fputs(buf, dest);
}
}
Live demo
The problem is that the function call
while (fscanf(ptr,"%*s %*s %s ",buf)==1)
consumes the input from the input stream, so that it is no longer available for copying. You are only saving the contents of the last field, but all other data is lost.
I suggest that you read one line at a time into a memory buffer, by calling the function fgets in a loop. That way, you will process one line of input per loop iteration, and will be saving the contents of the entire line.
In every loop iteration, you can use sscanf on this memory buffer to determine whether the third field has the desired value, and if it does, then you copy the entire line to the output file. Otherwise, you do nothing and proceed to the next line (i.e. the next loop iteration).
char line[100];
//process one line of input per loop iteration
while ( fgets( line, sizeof line, input_file ) != NULL )
{
char third_field[20];
if (
//third field was successfully extracted
sscanf( line, "%*s%*s%19s", third_field ) == 1
&&
//third field contains the string "5"
strcmp( third_field, "5" ) == 0
)
{
//copy entire line to output file
fputs( line, output_file );
}
}
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int main()
{
FILE* ptr = fopen("data.txt","r");
char filename[100];
if (ptr==NULL)
{
printf("no such file.");
return 0;
}
printf("Create a file \n");
scanf("%s", filename);
FILE* dest = fopen(filename, "w+"); // check for null like above
char buf[100];
char* char_to_find;
while (fscanf(ptr,"%99[^\n] ", buf) == 1){
char_to_find = buf;
while(*char_to_find != 0){
char_to_find++;
}
char_to_find--;
if(*char_to_find == '5'){
printf("%s\n", buf); // test ptint
fputs(buf, dest);
}
}
}

Printing the first 10 line of a file in C

I'm new to programming in C. And I'm trying to print the first 10 lines of a text file. When I run my program with a text file containing 11 lines of text, only the first line is displayed. I'm not sure why it does that, but I suspect there is something wrong in my while loop. Can someone please help me?
#include <stdio.h>
int main(int argc, char *argv[]){
FILE *myfile;
char content;
int max = 0;
// Open file
myfile = fopen(argv[1], "r");
if (myfile == NULL){
printf("Cannot open file \n");
exit(0);
}
// Read the first 10 lines from file
content = fgetc(myfile);
while (content != EOF){
max++;
if (max > 10)
break;
printf ("%c", content);
content = fgetc(myfile);
}
fclose(myfile);
return 0;
}
You have been already advised to use fgets. However, if your file has lines of unknown length, you may still want to use fgetc. Just make sure you count only newlines, not all characters:
int max = 0;
int content;
while ((content = fgetc(myfile)) != EOF && max < 10){
if (content == '\n') max++;
putchar(content);
}
fgetc() returns the next character in the file, not the next line. You probably want to use fgets() instead, which reads up to the next newline character into a buffer. Your code should probably end up with something like:
// allocate 1K for a buffer to read
char *buff = malloc(1024);
// iterate through file until we are out of data or we read 10 lines
while(fgets(buff, 1024, myfile) != NULL && max++ < 10) {
printf("%s\n", buff);
}
free(buff);
// close your file, finish up...
Read more about fgets() here: https://www.tutorialspoint.com/c_standard_library/c_function_fgets.htm
fgetc function reads the next character not the next ine. for reading the number of lines you should use fgets function. this function reads the full string till the end of the one line and stores it in a string.
your code Shuld be as:-
#include <stdio.h>
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
FILE *myfile;
char content[200];
int max = 0;
// Open file
myfile = fopen(argv[1], "r");
if (myfile == NULL)
{
printf("Cannot open file \n");
exit(0);
}
// Read the first 10 lines from file
fgets(content, 200, myfile);
while (content != EOF)
{
max++;
if (max > 10)
break;
printf("%s", content);
fgets(content, 200, myfile);
}
fclose(myfile);
return 0;
}

how to read specific lines of a text document and write them to another text | C

I have created a function that takes as a parameter the name of a source file, the name of a destination file and the beginning and end lines of the source file lines that will be copied to the destination file, like the example below. All I want to do is to input the lines that I want to copy to the other text file like the example below:
The code I show you just "reads" the content of the one text file and "writes" another one. I want to "write" specific lines that the user gives, not the whole text file
Inputs by the user:
Source_file.txt //the file that the destination file will read from
destination_file.txt //the new file that the program has written
2 3 // the lines that it will print to the destination file: 2-3
Source_file.txt:
1
2
3
4
5
6
destination_file.txt
2
3
code:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
void cp(char source_file[], char destination_file[], int lines_copy) {
char ch;
FILE *source, *destination;
source = fopen(source_file, "r");
if (source == NULL) {
printf("File name not found, make sure the source file exists and is ending at .txt\n");
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
destination = fopen(destination_file, "w");
if (destination == NULL) {
fclose(source);
printf("Press any key to exit...\n");
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
while ((ch = fgetc(source)) != EOF)
fputc(ch, destination);
printf("Copied lines %d from %s to %s \n",
lines_copy, source_file, destination_file, ".txt");
fclose(source);
fclose(destination);
}
int main() {
char s[20];
char d[20];
int lines;
printf("-Enter the name of the source file ending in .txt\n"
"-Enter the name of the destination file ending in .txt\n"
"-Enter the number of lines you want to copy\n\n");
printf(">subcopy.o ");
gets(s);
printf("destination file-> ");
gets(d);
printf("Lines: ");
scanf("%d", &lines);
cp(s, d, lines);
return 0;
}
In cp(), in order to select the lines to keep, you have to know their position in the input-file. Thus, you need to count lines.
Using fgets instead of fgetc will allow you to count the lines.
On the other hand, if I wanted to select lines 3 and 7 to 12 in a file, I'd use:
sed -n -e "3p;7,12p" < input.txt > output.txt
this is a very simple solution, let's say you know that the maximun length of a line will be 100 characters for simplicity (if a line is longer than 100 characters only the first 100 will be taken)
at the top (outside main) you can write
#ifndef MAX_LINE_SIZE
#define MAX_LINE_SIZE 100
#endif
i know many people don't like this but i think in this case it makes the code more elegant and easier to change if you need to modify the maximum line size.
to print only the wanted lines you can do something like this
char line[MAX_LINE_SIZE];
int count = 0;
while (fgets(line, MAX_LINE_SIZE, source)){
count++;
if (3 <= count && count <= 5){
fputs(line, destination);
}
}
The while loop will end when EOF is reched because fgets returns NULL.
P.S. there could be some slight errors here and there since i wrote it pretty fast and going by memory but in general it should work.
There are some problems in your program:
Do not use gets(), it may cause buffer overflows.
Always use type int to store the return value of fgetc() in order to distinguish EOF from regular byte values.
You pass an extra argument ".txt" to printf(). It will be ignored but should be removed nonetheless.
To copy a range of lines from source to destination, you can just modify your function this way:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <errno.h>
void cp(char source_file[], char destination_file[], int start_line, int end_line) {
int ch;
int line = 1, lines_copied;
FILE *source, *destination;
source = fopen(source_file, "r");
if (source == NULL) {
printf("Cannot open input file %s: %s\n",
source_file, strerror(errno));
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
destination = fopen(destination_file, "w");
if (destination == NULL) {
printf("Cannot open output file %s: %s\n",
destination_file, strerror(errno));
fclose(source);
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
while ((ch = fgetc(source)) != EOF) {
if (line >= start_line && line <= end_line) {
fputc(ch, destination);
}
if (ch == '\n') {
line++;
}
}
lines_copied = 0;
if (line > start_line) {
if (line >= end_line) {
lines_copied = end_line - start_line + 1;
} else {
lines_copied = line - start_line + 1;
}
}
printf("Copied lines %d from %s to %s\n",
lines_copy, source_file, destination_file);
fclose(source);
fclose(destination);
}
int main() {
char source_file[80];
char destination_file[80];
int start_line, end_line;
printf("-Enter the name of the source file ending in .txt\n"
"-Enter the name of the destination file ending in .txt\n"
"-Enter the start and end line\n\n");
printf(">subcopy.o ");
if (scanf("%79s", source_file) != 1) {
return 1;
}
printf("destination file-> ");
if (scanf("%79s", destination_file) != 1) {
return 1;
}
printf("Start and end lines: ");
if (scanf("%d %d", &start_line, &end_line) != 2) {
return 1;
}
cp(source_file, destination_file, start_line, end_line);
return 0;
}

Encrypt a message in C using file processing

Glad to ask you again!
I want to create a program that basically reads a file called message.txt which would have some texts with a message, let's say: ''Hello I am a program'' and then encrypts that message and puts it in a file called encryptMessage.txt, additionally it will save the key used for the user in the file key.txt. Now this is what I have done so far. I don't know how to make the program read the file message.txt, show it into the screen and then encrypt it into the file. Any piece of advice? Thank you!
I was planning to use fscanf, but I can't use it because it's a line, not just a single string.
Please, if possible write the code yourself so I can compare it to what I have written so far. I always appreciate your feedback, thanks!
#include <stdio.h>
#include <ctype.h>
#define MAXSIZE 100
int main(void)
{
FILE *message;
FILE *encryptMessage;
FILE *key;
message = fopen("message.txt", "r");
encryptMessage = fopen("encryptMessage.txt", "w");
key = fopen("key.txt", "w");
if ((encryptMessage == NULL) || (encryptMessage == NULL) || (encryptMessage == NULL))
{
printf("Error reading file!!!\n");
return 1;
}
int userKey;
char sentence[MAXSIZE];
char q[MAXSIZE];
int i = 0;
printf("Input the text that you want to encrypt:\n> "); // These two lines are a test to see if I was able to encrypt the message, but this is not necessary. It should directly read the file called message.txt.
fgets(sentence, 99, stdin);
// printf("\nThe string that you wrote is:\n%s\n\n", sentence);
printf("Input the key:\n");
scanf("%d", &userKey);
fprintf(key, "%d", userKey);
//printf("\nThe key that you selected is: %d\n\n", userKey);
for(i = 0; sentence[i] != '\0'; ++i)
{
if( ( isupper(sentence[i]) ) || ( islower(sentence[i]) ) )
{
q[i] = sentence[i] + (char)userKey;
}
else
{
q[i] = (sentence[i]);
}
}
q[i] = '\0';
printf("%s", q);
fprintf(encryptMessage, "%s", q);
fclose(encryptMessage);
return 0;
}
To read a line from message.txt you need to use fgets function.
fgets(sentence, 99, stdin);
The above fgets(which you have in your code) reads from the stdin which is normally the keyboard. To make it read from the text file,use
fgets(sentence, MAX_SIZE, message);
Note the change in the second argument too. If you want to display whatever was scanned,uncomment the below line which you have in your code
//printf("\nThe string that you wrote is:\n%s\n\n", sentence);
Don't forget to close(using fclose) all the FILE pointers which you had opened(using fopen) after its use.

Writing string to text file in C (extra blank space in the beginning of file)

I have a problem with writing a string to text file and reading it from file.
Input string (char text1) writes to the file (input.txt) correctly and reads too.
But I have a problem with the result file - the string seems to write to file correctly, but if I take a look at file, there is a blank space before the result string in file at the beginning. If I input text "weather is weather" then in the result file I have this -
"weather is is weather". The result string text is ok, the only problem is that for some reason, there is a blank space at the beginning of the result file.
When I print the contents of result file on the screen with this code
while((ch2 = fgetc(result)) != EOF)
printf("%c", ch2);
it prints nothing, but if I print the text2 string itself (not from file) with puts(text2); then it prints correctly.
What could be the cause of this problem and how could I solve it?
Here's the whole program:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int main()
{
char text1[200], text2[200], words[20][100], *dist, ch1, ch2;
int i, j, nwords=0;
FILE *input, *result;
input = fopen("input.txt", "w");
if(input == NULL)
{
perror("Error opening the file.\n");
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
// Text input
printf("\n Enter the text:\n\n ");
gets(text1);
fputs(text1, input);
fclose(input);
// Split string into words
dist = strtok(text1, " ,.!?");
i=0;
while(dist!=0)
{
strcpy(words[i],dist);
dist = strtok(NULL, " ,.!?");
i++;
nwords++;
}
// Duplicating words that doesn't repeat in input string and copy them into tex2 string
int flag_arr[20];
memset(flag_arr, 0, 20);
for(i=0; i <= nwords-1; i++)
{
for(j=0; j<=nwords-1; j++)
{
if(strcmp(words[i],words[j])==0)
{
flag_arr[i] += 1;
}
}
}
for(i = 0; i <=nwords-1; i++)
{
if(flag_arr[i] > 1)
{
strcat(text2," ");
strcat(text2,words[i]);
}
else
{
strcat(text2," ");
strcat(text2,words[i]);
strcat(text2," ");
strcat(text2,words[i]);
}
}
result = fopen("result.txt", "w");
if(result == NULL)
{
perror("Error opening the file.\n");
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
fputs(text2, result);
fclose(result);
// Rezultats
fopen("input.txt", "r");
if(input == NULL)
{
perror("Error opening the file.\n");
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
fopen("result.txt", "r");
if(result == NULL)
{
perror("Error opening the file.\n");
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
printf("\n\n\n Input:\n\n ");
while((ch1 = fgetc(input)) != EOF)
printf("%c", ch1);
// puts(input);
printf("\n\n\n Result:\n\n ");
while((ch2 = fgetc(result)) != EOF)
printf("%c", ch2);
// puts(text2);
fclose(input);
fclose(result);
getchar();
return 0;
}
It's because stdout is buffered. Either add a newline to your printing, or explicitly flush the buffer with
fflush(stdout);
You have this line
input = fopen("input.txt", "w");
And this line (two times, once is enough)
fopen("input.txt", "r");
Nowhere do you actually reassign the input variable. This means that when you attempt to read from input you will get an error (which you do not report) as you try to read from a write-only file handle.
Regarding your statement: then in the result file I have this - "weather is is weather".
In this block:
else
{
strcat(text2," ");
strcat(text2,words[i]);
strcat(text2," ");
strcat(text2,words[i]); //(change this to strcat(text2,words[i+1]);)
}
It looks like you are not incrementing i, and so will get the same word twice, separated by a space, " ".
By the way, this suggests that your file is fine, rather it is the way you are presenting the buffers after having extracted them that's the problem.
I realize the original problem is quite old, however I found the advice lacking and wanted to leave behind something more useful for understanding....
The most important issue with your program is one that the other programmers did not address. You must initialize text2.
You used strcat with text2 without first initializing text2. In other words you concatenated the contents of your pointer with text2, but text2 never had any value, so what was printed to screen (or file) was left over garbage.
The fact that your program worked after flushing has little to do with flushing but rather the random effects of memory.
char text1[20] = "";
char text2[20] = "";
Solves half the problem. The other issue is minor regarding when to put the spaces between words.
for(i = 0; i <=nwords-1; i++)
{
if(flag_arr[i] > 1)
{
strcat(text2,words[i]); // Check out the ordering here.
strcat(text2," ");
}
else
{
strcat(text2,words[i]);
strcat(text2," ");
strcat(text2,words[i]);
strcat(text2," ");
}
}

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