C --- Remove all extra spaces in string excluding chars between specified characters - c

Question

I have this string: print "Foo cakes are yum"
I need to somehow strip all extra whitespace but leave text between quotes alone. This is what i have so far:
char* clean_strip(char* string)
{
int d = 0, c = 0;
char* newstr;
while(string[c] != '\0'){
if(string[c] == ' '){
int temp = c + 1;
if(string[temp] != '\0'){
while(string[temp] == ' ' && string[temp] != '\0'){
if(string[temp] == ' '){
c++;
}
temp++;
}
}
}
newstr[d] = string[c];
c++;
d++;
}
return newstr;
}
This returns this string: print "Foo cakes are yum"
I need to be able to skip text between thw quotes so i get this: print "Foo cakes are yum".
Here is the same question but for php, i need a c answer: Remove spaces in string, excluding these in specified between specified characters
Please help.

Answer 1

Try this:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
char* clean_strip(char* string)
{
int d = 0, c = 0;
char* newstr = malloc(strlen(string)+1);
int quoted = 0;
while(string[c] != '\0'){
if (string[c] == '"') quoted = !quoted;
if(!quoted && string[c] == ' '){
int temp = c + 1;
if(string[temp] != '\0'){
while(string[temp] == ' ' && string[temp] != '\0'){
if(string[temp] == ' '){
c++;
}
temp++;
}
}
}
newstr[d] = string[c];
c++;
d++;
}
newstr[d] = 0;
return newstr;
}
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
char *input = "print \"Foo cakes are yum\"";
char *output = clean_strip(input);
printf(output);
free(output);
return 0;
}
This will produce the output:
print "Foo cakes are yum"
It works by looking for the " character. If it's found it toggles the variable quoted. If quoted is true, then the whitespace removal is skipped.
Also, your original function never allocates memory for newstr. I added the newstr = malloc(...) part. It is important to allocate memory for strings before writing to them.

Answer 2

I simplified your logic a little.
int main(void)
{
char string[] = "print \"Foo cakes are yum\"";
int i = 0, j = 1, quoted=0;
if (string[0] == '"')
{
quoted=1;
}
for(i=1; i< strlen(string); i++)
{
if (string[i] == '"')
{
quoted = 1-quoted;
}
string[j] = string[i];
if (string[j-1]==' ' && string[j] ==' ' && !quoted)
{
;
}
else
{
j++;
}
}
string[j]='\0';
printf("%s\n",string);
return 0;
}