I have a character pointer, which has a string assigned to it. And I'm sure that the string is of 8 characters length. (Ex: SHIVA0BS) And it is also a fact that the last two letters are always going to be "BS". But I'm just going to double check it. Now I'd like to take the first 6 characters ("SHIVA0") and append it to something else, say ("SHIVA0NN") - how would I make it possible?
#include<stdio.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
void main()
{
char *ptr, *new;
ptr = "FECI00BS";
strncpy(new,ptr,6);
printf("%s",new);
strcat(new,"NN");
}
The above code is what I wrote. And I'm not sure why it is not working. I understand that my requirement is very trivial, but I tried printfs in between. I was able to find that (ptr+6) printed "BS", so that 6 is the length that I need. But this is still not working. Any help appreciated. I need the output in a string pointer. A new one is fine. But a string pointer.
P.S: Only C code please. No C++.
You didn't allocate memory to hold your new string
char * new = calloc(1, 10); // on heap
or
char new[10]; // on stack
memset(new, 0, sizeof(new)); // zero it
You're not allocating memory for storing the strings.
You need to allocate memory for both *ptr and *new.
The bare minimum would be:
#include<stdio.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
#include<string.h>
int main()
{
char *ptr, *new;
new = (char*)malloc(sizeof(char) * 9);
new = (char*)malloc(sizeof(char) * 9);
ptr = "FECI00BS";
strncpy(a,ptr,6);
printf("%s",new);
strcat(a,"NN");
printf("%s",new);
}
You need 9 bytes (assuming your platform needs one byte per char) because of the End-Of-Line character, '\0', that needs to be present at the end of strings in order to use some string.h functions or print them correctly.
Also, read on why you need to be careful with strncpy. Depending on your platform, you may have access to some newer, safer alternatives from the C standard.
I think you want:
sprintf(ptr+6, "NN");
That will modify your buffer to convert BS into NN. In this case you can get rid of the new variable.
EDIT
Try this. Notice the char ptr[] instead of char* ptr. By using [] instead of a pointer you are allocating the buffer on the stack. This allows you to write to the buffer.
#include<stdio.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
void main()
{
char ptr[] = "FECI00BS";
sprintf(ptr+6,"NN");
printf(ptr);
}
Just a few simple checks and memcpy().
char *ShivaAppend(char *dest, const char *ptr, const char *suffix) {
size_t len = strlen(ptr);
if (len != 8) {
return NULL;
}
if (strcmp(ptr, "BS") != 0) {
return NULL;
}
len = strlen(suffix);
if (len != 2) {
return NULL;
}
memcpy(dest, ptr, 6);
memcpy(&dest[6], suffix, 2);
return dest;
}
...
char dest[9];
char *p = ShivaAppend(dest, "SHIVA0BS", "NN")
puts(p == NULL ? "fail", p);
Related
First of all Thanks for visiting my question... :)
I am interested in competitive programming, so I daily do some amount of problem-solving, however, I only know C language at a decent level, and I often face problems while dynamically allocating something as usual, especially for strings and 2D arrays.
But I somehow manage to find ways (thanks to StackOverflow), for example, I wanted to create a function that scans string dynamically until the user enters space or new line, so I came up with the solution below and it works perfectly:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
// scanf("%[^\n]%*c", str);
char *create_string(char *ptr)
{
ptr = (char *)malloc(0 * sizeof(char));
unsigned int size = 0;
char c = 0;
while (1)
{
scanf("%c", &c);
if (c == 32 || c == 10)
{
break;
}
size++;
ptr = (char *)realloc(ptr, size * sizeof(char));
ptr[size - 1] = c;
}
ptr = (char *)realloc(ptr, (size + 1) * sizeof(char));
ptr[size] = '\0';
return ptr;
}
int main()
{
char *str;
str = create_string(str);
printf("%s", str);
printf("\n%lu", strlen(str));
return 0;
}
And now for curiosity purposes, I want to know how can I do this same thing using the void function?, something like:
char *str;
create_string(&str);
should start storing everything in the dynamic memory which is pointed by str.
Also, please if you have more knowledge to show in DMA for 2D array, then please show me it, feel free to give examples with different problems.
And also How can I stop scanning the string (which was allocated dynamically) with specific string ending? for example, scanning(any kind of scanning, i.e. int, bool, custom structures etc...) should stop if user enters string "STOP", Please feel free to give pictorial examples.
Because I am sure that this question is burning like a fire in beginner's and intermediate C programmers' minds.
As C passes arguments by value, to return something via an out parameter, you need to pass in a pointer to it. So to return a char * it would:
void create_string(char **s) {
*s = malloc(42);
}
Here is your refactored code. I changed the following:
Eliminate return value of update caller.
Initialize *ptr = malloc(1) for the trailing '\0'. It eliminates an unnecessary and implementation defined malloc(0). This also eliminates the (*ptr)[size] = ... which looks wrong as the last index is expected to be size - 1. Alternatively initialize it to NULL.
Use character constants instead of magic values (32, 10).
sizeof(char) is defined as 1 so leave it out.
Reduced scope of variable c.
free() memory allocated.
(cosmetic) Use size_t size instead of unsigned int size.
(cosmetic) Avoid the noise of casting casting void *.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
void create_string(char **ptr) {
*ptr = malloc(1);
size_t size = 1;
for(;;) {
char c;
scanf("%c", &c);
if (c == ' ' || c == '\n') break;
(*ptr)[size-1] = c;
size++;
*ptr = realloc(*ptr, size);
}
(*ptr)[size-1] = '\0';
}
int main() {
char *str;
create_string(&str);
printf("%s\n", str);
printf("%zu\n", strlen(str));
free(str);
}
I didn't fix these issue:
Check return value of malloc(), realloc().
v = realloc(v, ...) is unsafe and will leak memory if realloc() fails. You need to do char *tmp = realloc(v,...); if(!tmp) { // err }; v = tmp;.
Check return value of scanf() otherwise you may be operating on uninitialized data.
Use scanf("%s", ..) instead of for(;;) { scanf("%c", ...). It's more efficient to allocate a chunk at a time instead of per byte.
If user enters ctrl-d (EOF) the program will go into an infinite loop.
It's good idea to separate i/o from logic (i.e. let caller do the scanf(). That way create_string() is much more reusable.
I am studying for a Data Structures and Algorithms exam. One of the sample questions related to dynamic memory allocation requires you to create a function that passes a string, which takes it at copies it to a user defined char pointer. The question provides the struct body to start off.
I did something like this:
typedef struct smart_string {
char *word;
int length;
} smart_string;
smart_string* create_smart_string(char *str)
{
smart_string *s = (smart_string*)malloc(sizeof(smart_string));
s->length = strlen(str);
s->word = malloc(s->length);
strcpy(s->word, str);
return s;
}
But the answer was this
typedef struct smart_string {
char *word;
int length;
} smart_string;
smart_string *create_smart_string(char *str)
{
smart_string *s = malloc(sizeof(smart_string));
s->length = strlen(str);
s->word = malloc(sizeof(char) * (s->length + 1));
strcpy(s->word, str);
return s;
}
I went on code:blocks and tested them both to see any major differences. As far as I'm aware, their outputs were the same.
I did my code the way it is because I figured if we were to allocate a specific block of memory to s->word, then it should be the same number of bytes as s ->length, because that's the string we want to copy.
However the correct answer below multiplies sizeof(char) (which is just 1 byte), with s->length + 1. Why the need to add 1 to s->length? What's the importance of multiplying s->length by sizeof(char)? What mistakes did I make in my answer that I should look out for?
sizeof(char) == 1 by definition, so that doesn't matter.
You should not cast the result of malloc: Do I cast the result of malloc?
And your only real difference is that strlen returns the length of the string, not including the terminating NUL ('\0') character, so you need to add + 1 to the size of the buffer as in the solution.
If you copy there the string, the terminating character won't be copied (or worse, it will be copied on some other memory), and therefore, any function that deals with strings (unless you use special safety functions such as strscpy) will run through the buffer and past it since they won't find the end. At that point it is undefined behaviour and everything can happen, even working as expected, but can't rely on that.
The reason it is working as expected is because probably the memory just next to the buffer will be 0 and therefore it is being interpreted as the terminating character.
Your answer is incorrect because it doesn't account for the terminating '\0'-character. In C strings are terminated by 0. That's how their length can be determined. A typical implementation of strlen() would look like
size_t strlen(char const *str)
{
for (char const *p = str; *p; ++p); // as long as p doesn't point to 0 increment p
return p - str; // the length of the string is determined by the distance of
} // the '\0'-character to the beginning of the string.
But both "solutions" are fubar, though. Why would one allocate a structure consisting of an int and a pointer on the free-store ("heap")!? smart_string::length being an int is the other wtf.
#include <stddef.h> // size_t
typedef struct smart_string_tag { // *)
char *word;
size_t length;
} smart_string_t;
#include <assert.h> // assert()
#include <string.h> // strlen(), strcpy()
#include <stdlib.h> // malloc()
smart_string_t create_smart_string(char const *str)
{
assert(str); // make sure str isn't NULL
smart_string_t new_smart_string;
new_smart_string.length = strlen(str);
new_smart_string.word = calloc(new_smart_string.length + 1, sizeof *new_smart_string.word);
if(!new_smart_string.word) {
new_smart_string.length = 0;
return new_smart_string;
}
strcpy(new_smart_string.word, str);
return new_smart_string;
}
*) Understanding C Namespaces
I have encountered so called cryptic realloc invalid next size error , I am using gcc on linux my code is
#include<stdio.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
#include<string.h>
int main()
{
int i;
char *buf;
char loc[120];
buf = malloc(1);
int size;
for(i=0;i<1920;i++)
{
sprintf(loc,"{Fill_next_token = my_next_token%d; Fill_next_token_id = my_next_token_id = my_next_token_id%d}",i,i);
size = strlen(buf)+strlen(loc);
printf("----%d\n",size);
if(!realloc(buf,size))
exit(1);
strcat(buf,loc);
}
}
(mine might be duplicate question) here the solution somewhere lies by avoiding strcat and to use memcpy , But in my case I really want to concatenate the string . Above code works for good for such 920 iterations but in case 1920 realloc gives invalid new size error. Please help to find alternative of concatenating , looking forward to be a helpful question for lazy programmers like me .
Your code has several issues:
You are not accounting for null terminator when deciding on the new length - it should be size = strlen(buf)+strlen(loc)+1;
You are ignoring the result of realloc - you need to check it for zero, and then assign it back to buf
You do not initialize buf to an empty string - this would make the first call of strlen produce undefined behavior (i.e. you need to add *buf = '\0';)
Once you fix these mistakes, your code should run correctly:
#include<stdio.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
#include<string.h>
int main() {
int i;
char *buf= malloc(1);
*buf='\0';
char loc[120];
for(i=0;i<1920;i++) {
sprintf(loc,"{Fill_next_token = my_next_token%d; Fill_next_token_id = my_next_token_id = my_next_token_id%d}",i,i);
int size = strlen(buf)+strlen(loc)+1;
printf("----%d\n",size);
char *tmp = realloc(buf,size);
if(!tmp) exit(1);
buf = tmp;
strcat(buf, loc);
}
}
Demo.
buf is not a valid string so strcat() will fail since it expects a \0 terminated string.
If you want to realloc() buf then you should assign the return value of realloc() to buf which you are not doing.
char *temp = realloc(buf,size+1);
if(temp != NULL)
buf = temp;
Point 1. Always use the return value of realloc() to access the newly allocated memory.
Point 2. strcat() needs a null-terminating string. Check the first iteration case.
I am a beginner in C. I wanted to make strcat function using pointers. I made it but don't know what is wrong with it. I used gcc compiler and it gave segmentation fault output.
#include<stdio.h>
#include<string.h>
char scat(char *,char *);
void main()
{
char *s="james";
char *t="bond";
char *q=scat(s,t);
while(*q!='\0') printf("the concatenated string is %c",*q);
}
char *scat(char *s,char *t)
{
char *p=s;
while(*p!='\0'){
p++;
}
while(*t!='\0'){
*p=*t;
p++;
t++;
}
return p-s-t;
}
This one works:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
char *scat(char *,char *); /* 1: your prototype was wrong */
void main()
{
char *s="james";
char *t="bond";
char *q=scat(s,t);
printf("cat: %s\n", q); /* 2: you can use %s to print a string */
free(q);
}
char *scat(char *s,char *t)
{
char *p=malloc(strlen(s)+strlen(t)+1); /* 3: you will have to reserve memory to hold the copy. */
int ptr =0, temp = 0; /* 4 initialise some helpers */
while(s[temp]!='\0'){ /* 5. use the temp to "walk" over string 1 */
p[ptr++] = s[temp++];
}
temp=0;
while(t[temp]!='\0'){ /* and string two */
p[ptr++]=t[temp++];
}
return p;
}
You have to allocate new space to copy at the end of s. Otherwise, your while loo[ will go in memory you don't have access to.
You shoul learn about malloc() here.
It is undefined behaviour to modify a string literal and s, and eventually p, is pointing to a string literal:
char* s = "james";
s is passed as first argument to scat() to which the local char* p is assigned and then:
*p=*t;
which on first invocation is attempting to overwite the null character an the end of the string literal "james".
A possible solution would be to use malloc() to allocate a buffer large enough to contain the concatentation of the two input strings:
char* result = malloc(strlen(s) + strlen(p) + 1); /* + 1 for null terminator. */
and copy them into it. The caller must remember to free() the returned char*.
You may find the list of frequently asked pointer questions useful.
Because p goes till the end of the string and then it starts advancing to illegal memory.
That is why you get segmentation fault.
It's because s points to "james\0", string literal & you cannot modify constant.
Change char *s="james"; to char s[50]="james";.
You need to understand the basics of pointers.
a char * is not a string or array of characters, it's the address of the beginning of the data.
you can't do a char * - char* !!
This is a good tutorial to start with
you will have to use malloc
You get a segmentation fault because you move the pointer to the end of s and then just start writing the data of p to the memory directly following s. What makes you believe there is writable memory available after s? Any attempt to write data to non-writable memory results in a segmentation fault and it looks like the memory following s is not writable (which is to expect, since "string constants" are usually stored in read-only memory).
Several things look out of order.
First keep in mind that when you want to return a pointer to something created within a function it needs to have been malloc'ed somewhere. Much easier if you pass the destination as an argument to the function. If you follow the former approach, don't forget to free() it when you're done with it.
Also, the function scat has to return a pointer in the declaration i.e. char *scat, not char scat.
Finally you don't need that loop to print the string, printf("%s", string); will take care of printing the string for you (provided it's terminated).
At first, your code will be in infinte loop because of the below line. you were supposed to use curely braces by including "p++; t++ " statements.
while(*t!='\0')
*p=*t;
though you do like this, you are trying to alter the content of the string literal. which will result in undefined behavior like segmentation fault.
A sequence of characters enclosed with in double quotes are called as string literal. it is also called as "string". String is fixed in size. once you created, you can't extend its size and alter the contents. Doing so will lead to undefined behavior.
To solve this problem , you need to allocate a new character array whose size is sum of the length of two strings passed. then append the two strings into the new array. finally return the address of the new array.
#include<stdio.h>
#include<string.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
char* scat(char *,char *);
void append(char *t , char *s);
int main(void)
{
char *s="james";
char *t="bond";
char *n = scat(s,t);
printf("the concatenated string is %s",n);
return 0;
}
char* scat(char *s,char *t)
{
int len = strlen(s) + strlen(t);
char *tmp = (char *)malloc(sizeof(char)* len);
append(tmp,s);
append(tmp,t);
return tmp;
}
void append(char *t , char *s)
{
//move pointer t to end of the string it points.
while(*t != '\0'){
t++;
}
while( *s != '\0' ){
*t = *s;
t++;
s++;
}
}
I am having trouble concatenating strings in C, without strcat library function. Here is my code
#include<stdio.h>
#include<string.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
int main()
{
char *a1=(char*)malloc(100);
strcpy(a1,"Vivek");
char *b1=(char*)malloc(100);
strcpy(b1,"Ratnavel");
int i;
int len=strlen(a1);
for(i=0;i<strlen(b1);i++)
{
a1[i+len]=b1[i];
}
a1[i+len]='\0';
printf("\n\n A: %s",a1);
return 0;
}
I made corrections to the code. This is working. Now can I do it without strcpy?
Old answer below
You can initialize a string with strcpy, like in your code, or directly when declaring the char array.
char a1[100] = "Vivek";
Other than that, you can do it char-by-char
a1[0] = 'V';
a1[1] = 'i';
// ...
a1[4] = 'k';
a1[5] = '\0';
Or you can write a few lines of code that replace strcpy and make them a function or use directly in your main function.
Old answer
You have
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 ...
a1 [V|i|v|e|k|0|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_]
b1 [R|a|t|n|a|v|e|l|0|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_]
and you want
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 ...
a1 [V|i|v|e|k|R|a|t|n|a|v|e|l|0|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_]
so ...
a1[5] = 'R';
a1[6] = 'a';
// ...
a1[12] = 'l';
a1[13] = '\0';
but with loops and stuff, right? :D
Try this (remember to add missing bits)
for (aindex = 5; aindex < 14; aindex++) {
a1[aindex] = b1[aindex - 5];
}
Now think about the 5 and 14 in the loop above.
What can you replace them with? When you answer this, you have solved the programming problem you have :)
char a1[] = "Vivek";
Will create a char array a1 of size 6. You are trying to stuff it with more characters than it can hold.
If you want to be able to accommodate concatenation "Vivek" and "Ratnavel" you need to have a char array of size atleast 14 (5 + 8 + 1).
In your modified program you are doing:
char *a1=(char*)malloc(100); // 1
a1 = "Vivek"; // 2
1: Will allocate a memory chunk of size 100 bytes, makes a1 point to it.
2: Will make a1 point to the string literal "Vivek". This string literal cannot be modified.
To fix this use strcpy to copy the string into the allocated memory:
char *a1=(char*)malloc(100);
strcpy(a1,"Vivek");
Also the for loop condition i<strlen(b1)-1 will not copy last character from the string, change it to i<strlen(b1)
And
a1[i]='\0';
should be
a1[i + len]='\0';
as the new length of a1 is i+len and you need to have the NUL character at that index.
And don't forget to free your dynamically allocated memory once you are done using it.
You cannot safely write into those arrays, since you have not made sure that enough space is available. If you use malloc() to allocate space, you can't then overwrite the pointer by assigning to string literal. You need to use strcpy() to copy a string into the newly allocated buffers, in that case.
Also, the length of a string in C is computed by the strlen() function, not length() that you're using.
When concatenating, you need to terminate at the proper location, which your code doesn't seem to be doing.
Here's how I would re-implement strcat(), if needed for some reason:
char * my_strcat(char *out, const char *in)
{
char *anchor = out;
size_t olen;
if(out == NULL || in == NULL)
return NULL;
olen = strlen(out);
out += olen;
while(*out++ = *in++)
;
return anchor;
}
Note that this is just as bad as strcat() when it comes to buffer overruns, since it doesn't support limiting the space used in the output, it just assumes that there is enough space available.
Problems:
length isn't a function. strlen is, but you probably shouldn't call it in a loop - b1's length won't change on us, will it? Also, it returns a size_t, which may be the same size as int on your platform but will be unsigned. This can (but usually won't) cause errors, but you should do it right anyway.
a1 only has enough space for the first string, because the compiler doesn't know to allocate extra stack space for the rest of the string since. If you provide an explicit size, like [100], that should be enough for your purposes. If you need robust code that doesn't make assumptions about what is "enough", you should look into malloc and friends, though that may be a lesson for another day.
Your loop stops too early. i < b1_len (assuming you have a variable, b1_len, that was set to the length of b1 before the loop began) would be sufficient - strlen doesn't count the '\0' at the end.
But speaking of counting the '\0' at the end, a slightly more efficient implementation could use sizeof a1 - 1 instead of strlen(a1) in this case, since a1 (and b1) are declared as arrays, not pointers. It's your choice, but remember that sizeof won't work for pointers, so don't get them mixed up.
EDIT: New problems:
char *p = malloc(/*some*/); p = /* something */ is a problem. = with pointers doesn't copy contents, it copies the value, so you're throwing away the old pointer value you got from malloc. To copy the contents of a string into a char * (or a char [] for that matter) you'd need to use strcpy, strncpy, or (my preference) memcpy. (Or just a loop, but that's rather silly. Then again, it may be good practice if you're writing your own strcat.)
Unless you're using C++, I wouldn't cast the return value of malloc, but that's a religious war and we don't need one of those.
If you have strdup, use it. If you don't, here is a working implementation:
char *strdup(const char *c)
{
size_t l = strlen(c);
char *d = malloc(l + 1);
if(d) memcpy(d, c, l + 1);
return d;
}
It is one of the most useful functions not in the C standard library.
You can do it using strcpy() too ;)
char *a = (char *) malloc(100);
char *b = (char *) malloc(100);
strcpy(a, "abc"); // initializes a
strcpy(b, "def"); // and b
strcpy((a + strlen(a)), b); // copy b at end of a
printf("%s\n",a); // will produce: "abcdef"
i think this is an easy one.
#include<stdio.h>
int xstrlen(char *);
void xstrcat(char *,char *,int);
void main()
{
char source[]="Sarker";
char target[30]="Maruf";
int j=xstrlen(target);
xstrcat(target,source,j);
printf("Source String: %s\nTarget String: %s",source,target);
}
int xstrlen(char *s)
{
int len=0;
while(*s!='\0')
{
len++;
s++;
}
return len;
}
void xstrcat(char *t,char *s,int j)
{
while(*t!='\0')
{
*t=*t;
t++;
}
while(*s!='\0')
{
*t=*s;
s++;
t++;
}
}
It is better to factor out your strcat logic to a separate function. If you make use of pointer arithmetic, you don't need the strlen function:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h> /* To completely get rid of this,
implement your our strcpy as well */
static void
my_strcat (char* dest, char* src)
{
while (*dest) ++dest;
while (*src) *(dest++) = *(src++);
*dest = 0;
}
int
main()
{
char* a1 = malloc(100);
char* b1 = malloc(100);
strcpy (a1, "Vivek");
strcpy (b1, " Ratnavel");
my_strcat (a1, b1);
printf ("%s\n", a1); /* => Vivek Ratnavel */
free (a1);
free (b1);
return 0;
}