gets(S)

gets, fgets -- get a string from a stream

Syntax

cc . . . -lc

#include  <stdio.h>

char *gets (s)
char *s;

char *fgets (s, n, stream)
char *s;
int n;
FILE *stream;

Description

The gets function reads characters from the standard input stream, stdin, into the array pointed to by s, until a new-line character is read or an end-of-file condition is encountered. The new-line character is discarded and the string is terminated with a null character. See warning below on the use of gets.

The fgets function reads characters from the stream into the array pointed to by s, until n-1 characters are read, or a new-line character is read and transferred to s, or an end-of-file condition is encountered. The string is then terminated with a null character.

Warning

The gets function is unsafe to use. It does not limit the number of characters placed into the passed buffer, even though that buffer has some fixed size. For this reason, the fgets function should be used instead.

fgets is not, however, a direct substitute for gets. With fgets, as soon as the buffer is filled, the remainder of the line is left for the next fgets, while gets always reads the entire line even when it overflows the buffer.

Diagnostics

If end-of-file is encountered and no characters have been read, no characters are transferred to s and a NULL pointer is returned. If a read error occurs, such as trying to use these functions on a file that has not been opened for reading, a NULL pointer is returned. Otherwise s is returned.

Standards conformance

fgets and gets are conformant with: