Explanation about missing prototype error - c

I am getting the following error #error cpstm8 main.c missing prototype, but what I do not understand is the reason that I am receiving it, I declared the prototype of my function on the top and this error still keep happening, maybe I am missing something, the code follows below.
In my code, I want to gather the data coming from USB, save it in a variable for processing it later.
int * UART1_ReceiveBytes();
void main(void)
{
while (TRUE)
{
int * p;
p = UART1_ReceiveBytes();
}
}
int * UART1_ReceiveBytes()
{
int i = 0;
int buf [3] = {0x30, 0x30, 0x30};
if (UART1_GetFlagStatus(UART1_FLAG_RXNE) != RESET)
{
do
{
buf[i] = UART1_ReceiveData8();
i++;
delay_ms(10);
}while(i != 3);
UART1_ClearFlag(UART1_FLAG_RXNE);
}
return buf;
}
I am using COSMIC as a compiler since I am programming STM8
I follow the solution that #Eraklon gave (int * UART1_ReceiveBytes(void);)
This solved the problem.
I would like to know if declaring void is just about the compiler or there is some specific rule? Most examples that I was looking declared the prototype like this (int * UART1_ReceiveBytes();)

I would like to know if declaring void is just about the compiler or
there is some specific rule? Most examples that I was looking declared
the prototype like this (int * UART1_ReceiveBytes();)
It is a compiler dependent case, where, In GCC compiler it won't show any errors, It just ignore them.
Including "void" in the function prototype will specify that, no parameters should be passed while calling the function. By mistakenly, if programmer passes any parameter, During compilation phase It will check the prototype and will throw an error stating that "Function should not contain parameter".
Some compilers might take them serious (COSMIC) and some compiler may not (GCC).

Related

I want to implement a stack but printf throws a segmentation fault

I want to implement a stack using structures in C. Unfortunately, printf throws a segmentation fault. Perhaps there is a problem with dynamic allocation. Does anyone know how to solve it?
I have been facing this issue for the last two days. Your help will be very helpful for my study.
Here is my code
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <stdbool.h>
#define SIZE 256
typedef int (*pf)();
typedef struct _stack{
int arr[SIZE];
int top;
pf push, pop, peek, isEmpty, size, clear, print;
} stack;
void *nstack(){
stack *pstack = (stack *)malloc(sizeof(stack));
void push(int data) {
if(pstack->top < SIZE-1) pstack->arr[++pstack->top]=data;
}
int pop() {
return (pstack->top >= 0)?pstack->arr[pstack->top--]:0;
}
int peek(){
return (pstack->top >= 0)?pstack->arr[pstack->top]:0;
}
bool isEmpty(){
return (pstack->top >= 0)?false:true;
}
int size(){
return pstack->top+1;
}
void clear(){
pstack->top = -1;
}
void print(){
if(!isEmpty()){
for(int i = 0; i <= pstack->top; i++) printf("%d", pstack->arr[i]);
printf("\n");
}
}
pstack->push=push;
pstack->pop=pop;
pstack->peek=peek;
pstack->isEmpty=isEmpty;
pstack->size=size;
pstack->clear=clear;
pstack->print=print;
pstack->top=-1;
return pstack;
}
void dstack(stack *pstack){
free(pstack);
}
void main() {
stack *A = nstack();
A->push(1);
A->push(4);
A->push(6);
printf("%d",A->pop());
printf("%d",A->pop());
dstack(A);
}
While the code compiles (with warning), it try to leverage GCC extensions for functions within functions. However, the internal functions must be called within a valid context - they try to access the local pstackof the nstack function - but it does not exists.
While this style work in many OO langauges (Java, and possibly C++), that support 'closures' or lambda, it does not work for C. Consider changing the interface for each of the function to take stack *, and change the calling sequence to pass it.
void push(stack *pstack, int data) {
if(pstack->top < SIZE-1) pstack->arr[++pstack->top]=data;
}
main() {
...
A->push(A, 1) ;
...
printf("%d", A->pop(A) ;
}
Really, you should edit your question and provide the exact errors but I've decided to do some of the legwork for you since you're probably pretty new to this.
So first thing I did was compile your code here with -Wall and look what I get:
SO_stack.c: In function ‘nstack’:
SO_stack.c:49:17: warning: assignment from incompatible pointer type [-Wincompatible-pointer-types]
pstack->push=push;
^
SO_stack.c:52:20: warning: assignment from incompatible pointer type [-Wincompatible-pointer-types]
pstack->isEmpty=isEmpty;
^
SO_stack.c:54:18: warning: assignment from incompatible pointer type [-Wincompatible-pointer-types]
pstack->clear=clear;
^
SO_stack.c:55:18: warning: assignment from incompatible pointer type [-Wincompatible-pointer-types]
pstack->print=print;
^
SO_stack.c: At top level:
SO_stack.c:66:6: warning: return type of ‘main’ is not ‘int’ [-Wmain]
void main() {
Let's look at the first error on line 49: pstack->push=push;
You've defined push function prototype as: void push(int data) but pstack->push is of type pf which is defined as int (*pf)(); See the problem here? You're trying to pass an argument to a function pointer that is not properly defined to handle the argument AND the return type is different. This is totally wrong. Your push(int data) implementation declares a return type of void and a parameter of int yet your pointer to this function declares a return type of int and a parameter of void. This is the case with push, isEmpty, clear, and print. You're going to have to decide if all of these functions need to have the same prototype or if you need to create several different function pointer types to handle them, etc...
So that's the first problem.
Second problem is that as the warning says, you have a void main() prototype for your main function. You should return int from main and specify a return code to the caller of main (likely the OS)... Commonly, successful execution returns 0 and failure returns -1 but this is specific to the platform so you can instead return EXIT_SUCCESS on success and return EXIT_FAILURE upon failure from main. For this macros to be defined, you need to have #include <stdlib.h> present, which you do.
Next issue is that as a commenter wrote, you should learn to use a debugger such as GDB, LLDB, or Windows Debugger so that you can figure out exactly where the program crashes.
I've not re-written your program because it has so many issues that I don't think it would be constructive to do so in this iteration, however, provide an exact error next time, and use the debugger to see if the crash happens inside of the actual printf() code as you implied, or it happens because you supplied corrupt memory to the printf function. My guess is that it is the latter... Meaning, it is in fact probably your code which is flawed and supplying an invalid char * to printf which is either out of bounds, nonexistent, etc... This is precisely what you will use a debugger to find out, by placing a breakpoint before the trouble code and watching the memory to see what's going on.
You need to either remove int data.
Work on this some more, and you will probably find the rest of the issues yourself, if there are any. You should compile with flag -Wall and consider compiling with flag -Werror to clear this kind of stuff up yourself in the future.

Confused about detecting the errors of this code in c programming language?

The code given below is an exercise that our teacher gave to prepare us for exams.
We are supposed to find the errors that occur in this code and fully explain them .
#define SIZE 10
int start (void a,int k) {
const int size=10;
char array[size];
char string[SIZE];
mycheck(3,4);
array[0]=string[0]='A';
printf("%c %c\n", array[0], string[0]);
myRec(7);
}
int mycheck(int a , int b) {
if (a==0 || b==0 ) {
return 0;
}
else {
return (a*b);
}
}
int myRec(int x) {
if(x==0)
return 0;
else
printf("%d,",x);
myRec(x--);
}
I have found these errors so far:
1.int start (void a,int k)
explanation: We can't have a variable of type void, because void is an incomplete type
2.const int size=10;
explanation:we can't use variable to define size of array
(problem is when I run it in dev-c++ it doesn't show an error so I'm not sure about this)
3.mycheck(3,4);
explanation: prototype of function mycheck() is not declared, so the function mycheck is not visible to the compiler while going through start() function
4.A friend told me that there is an error in function myRec because of this statement myRec(x--);
(I don't really get why is this an error and how you can I explain it?)
5.Main() function doesn't exist.
I'm not sure about this but if i run the code (in dev-c++) without main function I get a compilation error
I'm not sure if the errors that I pointed out are 100% right or if I missed an error or if I explained them correctly.
Please correct me if any of the above is wrong!
a friend told me that there is an error in function myRec cuz of this
statement myRec(x--);
It will lead to stackoverflow. Due to post-decrement, the actual argument passed to function myRec(), never decreases and therefore the condition:
if(x==0)
return 0;
will never become true. Regarding your rest of the errors, it depends on the compiler version being used:
For example C99, you are allowed to have variable size arrays like this:
const int size=10;
char array[size];
char string[SIZE];
but pre C99, you would have to use malloc or calloc. For your functions used without prototype, most compilers would generate a warning and not error and also due to no #include<stdio.h> statement, your printf would also lead to a warning.i Again, lot of these things are compiler dependent.
1.int start (void a,int k)
explanation: We can't have a variable of type void ,because void is an
incomplete type
Correct.
2.const int size=10;
explanation:we can't use variable to define size of array (problem is
when i run it in dev-c++ it doesnt show an error?so im not sure about
this!)
This is also correct, that char array[size];, where size is not a compile-time constant, is invalid in C89. However, in C99 and newer, this is actually valid and would create a variable-length array. It is possible that your Dev-C++ IDE is using GCC with the language set to C99 or newer, or has GNU C extensions enabled to enable this feature.
3.mycheck(3,4);
explanation: prototype of function mycheck() is not declared.So the
function mycheck is not visible to the compiler while going through
start() function
Correct. This can be fixed either by declaring the function's prototype before the start() function, or just moving the whole function to the top of the file. As noted by Toby Speight in the comments, in C89, this should not actually be a compiler error, since functions are implicitly declared when they are used before any actual declaration as int (), i.e. a function returning int with any arguments, which is compatible with the declarations of mycheck and myRec. It is however bad practice to rely on this, and implicit function declaration does not work in C99 or newer.
4.a friend told me that there is an error in function myRec cuz of this statement myRec(x--);
(I don't really get why is this an error and how you can explain it?)
This function is a recursive function. This means it calls itself within itself in order to achieve a kind of looping. However, this function as it is currently written would run forever and cause an infinite loop, and since it is a recursive function, and needs a new stack frame each time it is called, it will most likely end in a stack overflow.
The function is written with this statement:
if(x==0)
return 0;
This is intended to terminate the recursion as soon as x reaches 0. However, this never happens, because of this line of code here:
myRec(x--);
In C, postfix -- and ++ operators evaluate to their original value before the addition or subtraction:
int x = 5;
int y = x--;
/* x is now 4; y is now 5 */
However, using the prefix version of these operators will evaluate to their new value after adding / subtracting 1:
int x = 5;
int y = --x;
/* x is now 4; y is now 4 */
This means that on each recursion, the value of x never actually changes and so never reaches 0.
So this line of code should actually read:
myRec(--x);
Or even just this:
myRec(x - 1);
5.Main() function doesn't exist ...again im not sure about this but if i run the code (in dev-c++) without main function i get a compilation
error
This one could either be right or wrong. If the program is meant to run on its own, then yes, there should be a main function. It's possible that the function start here should actually be int main(void) or int main(int argc, char *argv[]). It is entirely valid however to compile a C file without a main, for example when making a library or one individual compilation unit in a bigger program where main is defined in another file.
Another problem with the program is that myRec is used before it is declared, just like your point 3 where mycheck is used before it is declared.
One more problem is that the functions start and mycheck are declared to return int, yet they both do not contain a return statement which returns an int value.
Other than that, assuming that this is the entire verbatim source of the program, the header stdio.h isn't included, yet the function printf is being used. Finally, there's the issue of inconsistent indentation. This may or may not be something you are being tested for, but it is good practice to indent function bodies, and indentation should be the same number of spaces / tab characters wherever it's used, e.g.:
int myRec(int x) {
if(x==0)
return 0;
else
printf("%d,",x);
myRec(x--);
}
1) Hello friend your Recursive function myRec() will go infinite because it
call itself with post detriment value as per C99 standard it will
first call it self then decrements but when it call itself again it have
to do the same task to calling self so it will never decrements and new
stack is created and none of any stack will clear that recursion so
stack will full and you will get segmentation fault because it will go
beyond stack size.
2) printf("%d,",x); it should be printf("%d",x); and you should include #include library.
I think your another mistake is you are calling your mycheck() and you
returning multiplication of two integer but you are not catch with any
value so that process got west.So while you are returning something you
must have to catch it otherwise no need to return it.
3) In this you Program main() function missing. Program execution starts
with main() so without it your code is nothing. if you want to execute
your code by your own function then you have to do some process but
here main() should be present.or instead of start() main() should
be present.
4) you can also allocate any char buffer like this int j; char array[j=20];
your code should be like this.
#include<stdio.h>
#define SIZE 10
int mycheck(int a , int b) {
if (a==0 || b==0 ) {
return 0;
}
else {
return (a*b);
}
}
int myRec(int x) {
if(x==0)
return 0;
else
printf("%d",x);
myRec(--x);
}
void main (int argc, char** argv) {
const int size=10;
char array[size];
char string[SIZE];
int catch = mycheck(3,4);
printf("return value:: %d\n",catch);
array[0]=string[0]='A';
printf("%c %c\n", array[0], string[0]);
myRec(7);
printf("\n");
}
Enjoy.............

Simple C program that will read the number of lines and will terminate once the EOF is entered by the user

#include <stdio.h>
int read_next_line()
{
int ch;
int flag=0;
ch=getchar();
while(ch!= EOF && ch!='\n') {
ch=getchar();
flag=1;
}
return flag || (ch=='\n');
}
int read_all_lines()
{
int linecount=0;
int isvalid;
while(!feof(stdin)) {
isvalid=read_next_line();
linecount=linecount + isvalid;
}
return linecount;
}
main {
read_all_lines();
}
The above code gives an error saying main does not have a type.
How to solve the problem ?
main is a function that returns a value like other functions. It is up to you if it returns nothing void main(void){ } or an int value, 0 is returned in POSIX systems if no error encountered. More sophisticated but readable is to put exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);.
int main(void){
...
}
The proper prototype in most environments is:
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
This means:
main() is a function that returns an int.
It has one argument called argc that is the number of command-line arguments.
It has one argument called argv that is an array of those arguments.
It should be int main() instead of simply main
Since C98 I think, C disallows to declare a function without using the return type for the result anymore. You have to declare main as
int main ()
{
...
}
This is the minimum requirement to make your code compilable. In previous releases of the C language, it was allowed to declare a function like you have done. Implicitly, the compiler assumed it to be an int function without any complaint. But, as for sure you have your compiler configured to compile post C98 or later code, it complaints with an error. Previous versions of actual compilers issue normally a warning, telling you main will be assumed to be an int function, and this is to be able to compile old pre-ANSI code.
By the way, next time, don't limit yourself to explain what you have coded. Cut and paste your actual code here, and also the exact error you got from the compiler (probably, it was only a warning, but you didn't include it, so we'll never know) Probably the mistake is not where you think of, and that way saves us time and you the need of receiving this complaint.

How to determine the length of a function?

Consider the following code that takes the function f(), copies the function itself in its entirety to a buffer, modifies its code and runs the altered function. In practice, the original function that returns number 22 is cloned and modified to return number 42.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
#define ENOUGH 1000
#define MAGICNUMBER 22
#define OTHERMAGICNUMBER 42
int f(void)
{
return MAGICNUMBER;
}
int main(void)
{
int i,k;
char buffer[ENOUGH];
/* Pointer to original function f */
int (*srcfptr)(void) = f;
/* Pointer to hold the manipulated function */
int (*dstfptr)(void) = (void*)buffer;
char* byte;
memcpy(dstfptr, srcfptr, ENOUGH);
/* Replace magic number inside the function with another */
for (i=0; i < ENOUGH; i++) {
byte = ((char*)dstfptr)+i;
if (*byte == MAGICNUMBER) {
*byte = OTHERMAGICNUMBER;
}
}
k = dstfptr();
/* Prints the other magic number */
printf("Hello %d!\n", k);
return 0;
}
The code now relies on just guessing that the function will fit in the 1000 byte buffer. It also violates rules by copying too much to the buffer, since the function f() will be most likely a lot shorter than 1000 bytes.
This brings us to the question: Is there a method to figure out the size of any given function in C? Some methods include looking into intermediate linker output, and guessing based on the instructions in the function, but that's just not quite enough. Is there any way to be sure?
Please note: It compiles and works on my system but doesn't quite adhere to standards because conversions between function pointers and void* aren't exactly allowed:
$ gcc -Wall -ansi -pedantic fptr.c -o fptr
fptr.c: In function 'main':
fptr.c:21: warning: ISO C forbids initialization between function pointer and 'void *'
fptr.c:23: warning: ISO C forbids passing argument 1 of 'memcpy' between function pointer and 'void *'
/usr/include/string.h:44: note: expected 'void * __restrict__' but argument is of type 'int (*)(void)'
fptr.c:23: warning: ISO C forbids passing argument 2 of 'memcpy' between function pointer and 'void *'
/usr/include/string.h:44: note: expected 'const void * __restrict__' but argument is of type 'int (*)(void)'
fptr.c:26: warning: ISO C forbids conversion of function pointer to object pointer type
$ ./fptr
Hello 42!
$
Please note: on some systems executing from writable memory is not possible and this code will crash. It has been tested with gcc 4.4.4 on Linux running on x86_64 architecture.
You cannot do this in C. Even if you knew the length, the address of a function matters, because function calls and accesses to certain types of data will use program-counter-relative addressing. Thus, a copy of the function located at a different address will not do the same thing as the original. Of course there are many other issues too.
In the C standard, there is no notion of introspection or reflection, thus you'd need to devise a method yourself, as you have done, some other safer methods exists however.
There are two ways:
Disassemble the function (at runtime) till you hit the final RETN/JMP/etc, while accounting for switch/jump tables. This of course requires some heavy analysis of the function you disassemble (using an engine like beaEngine), this is of course the most reliable, but its slow and heavy.
Abuse compilation units, this is very risky, and not fool proof, but if you know you compiler generates functions sequentially in their compilation unit, you can do something along these lines:
void MyFunc()
{
//...
}
void MyFuncSentinel()
{
}
//somewhere in code
size_t z = (uintptr_t)MyFuncSentinel - (uintptr_t)MyFunc;
uint8_t* buf = (uint8_t*)malloc(z);
memcpy(buf,(char*)MyFunc,z);
this will have some extra padding, but it will be minimal (and unreachable). although highly risky, its a lot faster that the disassemble method.
note: both methods will require that the target code has read permissions.
#R.. raises a very good point, your code won't be relocatable unless its PIC or you reassasmble it in-place to adjust the addresses etc.
Here is a standards compliant way of achieving the result you want:
int f(int magicNumber)
{
return magicNumber;
}
int main(void)
{
k = f(OTHERMAGICNUMBER);
/* Prints the other magic number */
printf("Hello %d!\n", k);
return 0;
}
Now, you may have lots of uses of f() all over the place with no arguments and not want to go through your code changing every one, so you could do this instead
int f()
{
return newf(MAGICNUMBER);
}
int newf(int magicNumber)
{
return magicNumber;
}
int main(void)
{
k = newf(OTHERMAGICNUMBER);
/* Prints the other magic number */
printf("Hello %d!\n", k);
return 0;
}
I'm not suggesting this is a direct answer to your problem but that what you are doing is so horrible, you need to rethink your design.
Well, you can obtain the length of a function at runtime using labels:
int f()
{
int length;
start:
length = &&end - &&start + 11; // 11 is the length of function prologue
// and epilogue, got with gdb
printf("Magic number: %d\n", MagicNumber);
end:
return length;
}
After executing this function we know its length, so we can malloc for the right length, copy and editing the code, then executing it.
int main()
{
int (*pointerToF)(), (*newFunc)(), length, i;
char *buffer, *byte;
length = f();
buffer = malloc(length);
if(!buffer) {
printf("can't malloc\n");
return 0;
}
pointerToF = f;
newFunc = (void*)buffer;
memcpy(newFunc, pointerToF, length);
for (i=0; i < length; i++) {
byte = ((char*)newFunc)+i;
if (*byte == MagicNumber) {
*byte = CrackedNumber;
}
}
newFunc();
}
Now there's another bigger problem though, the one #R. mentioned. Using this function once modified (correctly) results in segmentation fault when calling printf because the call instruction has to specify an offset which will be wrong. You can see this with gdb, using disassemble f to see the original code and x/15i buffer to see the edited one.
By the way, both my code and yours compile without warnings but crash on my machine (gcc 4.4.3) when calling the edited function.

Pass 2d array to function in C?

I know it's simple, but I can't seem to make this work.
My function is like so:
int GefMain(int array[][5])
{
//do stuff
return 1;
}
In my main:
int GefMain(int array[][5]);
int main(void)
{
int array[1800][5];
GefMain(array);
return 0;
}
I referred to this helpful resource, but I am still getting the error "warning: passing argument 1 of GefMain from incompatible pointer type." What am I doing wrong?
EDIT:
The code is in two files, linked together by the compiler. I am not using gcc. The above code is exactly what I have, except the function is declared as "extern int" in the main. Thank you all for your time.
The code is fine. In a single file, this compiles fine for me with gcc.
int g(int arr[][5])
{
return 1;
}
int main()
{
int array[1800][5];
g(array);
return 0;
}
My guess is that you're #includeing the wrong file -- perhaps one that had a different declaration for GefMain. Or perhaps you just haven't saved the file that declared GefMain, so it still has an argument of int [][3], for instance, which would cause the warning.
I would suggest that you post the entire code to reproduce the problem (after you strip out everything that's unneeded to reproduce it, of course). But chances are, at that point, you'll have solved it yourself.
It compiles rightly even with -std=c99 -pedantic options. And it looks right anyway... Is it really the code you want we check? Compiler you're using...?
gcc will have extensions for what you've had (and others have had sucess with). Instead try this, it'll be more portable to other c compilers:
int g(int (* arr)[5])
{
return 1;
}
int main()
{
int array[1800][5];
g(array);
return 0;
}
or better yet;
int g(int (* arr)[5], int count)
{
return 1;
}
int main()
{
int array[1800][5];
g(array, sizeof(array)/sizeof(* array));
return 0;
}
You're getting a warning because an array of any dimension becomes a pointer when it is passed as an arguement, the above gives the compiler a clue that it should expect such.

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