why \n stop the next send socket? C - c

Question

I've tried to put \0 at the end of the message, but that didn't work. I've also put the terminating char when receiving the socket in the client side but that didn't work either. Here is an image of the console:
server side:
char u[BUFFER]
char *msg = "You are required to enter username:\n\n";
send(clie, msg, strlen(msg), 0);
// not shown on console
char *u_msg = "Username: ";
send(clie, u_msg, strlen(u_msg), 0);
recv(clie, u, sizeof(u), 0);
client-side
char srecv[BUFFER]; // BUFFER = 1024
while (1) {
bytes = recv(ser, & srecv, BUFFER, 0);
srecv[bytes] = '\0';
printf("%s", srecv);
scanf("%s", ssend);
if (send(ser, ssend, strlen(ssend), 0) == -1) {
perror("send\n");
exit(1);
}
}

Answer 1

Since there are multiple '\n' characters in your server's messaging, that is not sufficient to let the client know when each message has finished being received. You should either:
send a message's length before sending the actual message.
send a unique terminator at the end of each message (in your example, the null terminator will suffice).
Either way will allow the client to keep reading and displaying a message's bytes to the console until the true end of message has been reached, BEFORE then reading the user's response from the console. The client MUST wait to receive both messages in their entirety before then calling scanf().
There is no 1:1 relationship between send() and recv() in TCP, you MUST be prepared to handle that. Both functions MAY return fewer bytes than requested, so both functions must be called in loops until all expected bytes are sent/received. And messages MUST be explicitly framed by the sender in such a way that the receiver knows when a message actually ends.
Try something more like this instead:
Common code for both sides:
int sendAll(int sckt, const void *data, size_t size)
{
const char *pdata = (const char*) data;
while (size > 0)
{
ssize_t sent = send(sckt, pdata, size, 0);
if (sent < 0) return -1;
pdata += sent;
size -= sent;
}
return 0;
}
int recvAll(int sckt, void *data, size_t size)
{
char *pdata = (char*) data;
while (size > 0)
{
ssize_t recvd = recv(sckt, pdata, size, 0);
if (recvd <= 0) return recvd;
pdata += recvd;
size -= recvd;
}
return 1;
}
int sendMsg(int sckt, const char *msg)
{
uint32_t msglen = strlen(msg);
uint32_t temp = htonl(msglen);
int ret = sendAll(sckt, &temp, sizeof(temp));
if (ret == 0) ret = sendAll(sckt, msg, msglen);
return ret;
}
int recvMsg(int sckt, char **msg)
{
*msg = NULL;
uint32_t msglen = 0;
int ret = recvAll(sckt, &msglen, sizeof(msglen));
if (ret <= 0) return ret;
msglen = ntohl(msglen);
char *pmsg = (char*) malloc(msglen+1);
if (!pmsg) return NULL;
if (msglen > 0)
{
ret = recvAll(sckt, pmsg, msglen);
if (ret <= 0)
{
free(pmsg);
return ret;
}
}
pmsg[msglen] = '\0';
*msg = pmsg;
return 1;
}
Alternatively:
int sendMsg(int sckt, const char *msg)
{
if (!msg) msg = "\0";
int size = strlen(msg) + 1;
do
{
ssize_t sent = send(sckt, msg, size, 0);
if (sent < 0) return -1;
msg += sent;
size -= sent;
}
while (size > 0);
return 0;
}
int recvMsg(int sckt, char **msg)
{
char c, buf[1024];
int inbuf = 0;
char *pmsg = NULL;
int msglen = 0;
*msg = NULL;
do
{
ssize_t ret = recv(sckt, &c, 1, 0);
if (ret <= 0)
{
if (pmsg) free(pmsg);
return ret;
}
if (c == '\0')
break;
if (inbuf == sizeof(buf))
{
char *newmsg = (char*) realloc(msg, msglen + inbuf + 1);
if (!newmsg)
{
if (pmsg) free(pmsg);
return -1;
}
memcpy(buf, &newmsg[msglen], inbuf);
newmsg[msglen + inbuf] = '\0';
pmsg = newmsg;
msglen += inbuf;
inbuf = 0;
}
buf[inbuf] = c;
++inbuf;
}
while (1);
if ((inbuf > 0) || (msglen == 0))
{
char *newmsg = (char*) realloc(msg, msglen + inbuf + 1);
if (!newmsg)
{
if (pmsg) free(pmsg);
return -1;
}
if (inbuf > 0) memcpy(buf, &newmsg[msglen], inbuf);
newmsg[msglen + inbuf] = '\0';
pmsg = newmsg;
}
*msg = pmsg;
return 1;
}
Server side:
sendMsg(clie, "You are required to enter username:\n\n");
sendMsg(clie, "Username: ");
char *u;
if (recvMsg(clie, &u) == 1)
{
...
free(u);
}
Client side:
char *msg;
while (1) {
ret = recvMsg(ser, &msg);
if (ret <= 0)
{
if (ret < 0)
{
perror("recvMsg\n");
exit(1);
}
break;
}
printf("%s", msg);
if (strcmp(msg, "Username: ") == 0)
{
scanf("%s", ssend);
if (sendMsg(ser, ssend) == -1)
{
perror("sendMsg\n");
exit(1);
}
}
free(msg);
}