Question

I am having trouble with some file IO stuff.

I have this file:

db.dat:

Ryan
12 69.00 30.00 0.00
Bindy Lee
25 120.00 89.00 1.00

And this is my code:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>

#define RECORDS 30
#define LEN 20

main()
{
    FILE *fptr;
    fptr = fopen("db.dat", "r");
    int i;
    int counter = 2;

    for (i = 0; i < counter; i++)
    {
        char temp1[LEN];
        char temp2[LEN + 10];

        fgets(temp1, LEN, fptr);
        fgets(temp2, LEN, fptr);
        printf("%s %s", temp1, temp2);
    }

    fclose(fptr);      
}

I am supposed to get both lines, but I am getting this instead:

Ryan
 12 69.00 30.00 0.00
 Bindy Lee

Can someone please help! I don’t know why I am not getting both lines, and why I am getting spaces. Very odd…Thanks!!!!

Answer 1

fgets stops after it reads LEN characters OR reaches the end of the line. I think your problem here is that you made LEN too small.

Change your printf to something more verbose like printf("temp1='%s'\ntemp2='%s'\n", temp1, temp2); and you should be able to see what was actually read into each string.