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11-Pointers and Files

This document provides 3 sentences summarizing key points about strings, pointers, and file input/output in C: Strings are character arrays that end with a null character, and comparing or assigning strings requires explicit functions. Pointers store the address of a variable and dereferencing the pointer accesses the value at that address. Files can be opened, read from, written to, and closed using standard library functions like fopen(), fread(), fwrite(), and fclose().

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43 views16 pages

11-Pointers and Files

This document provides 3 sentences summarizing key points about strings, pointers, and file input/output in C: Strings are character arrays that end with a null character, and comparing or assigning strings requires explicit functions. Pointers store the address of a variable and dereferencing the pointer accesses the value at that address. Files can be opened, read from, written to, and closed using standard library functions like fopen(), fread(), fwrite(), and fclose().

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conceptle48
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Introduction to pointers and

File Input and Output


Strings

■ string is a character array whose last character is


‘\0’
■ string is not a data type in C
■ and hence comparing two strings, or assigning a
string has to done explicitly through functions
❑ Eg: char str[ ] = “hello”;
char name[ ] = “world”;
if (name == str) /* this compares just starting addresses*/
{
…;
}

11/22/2022 2
Strings

■ Most common functions for strings are defined


in a standard library with header file string.h
■ For example:
❑ int strlen(char s[ ])
{
int j = 0;
while(s[j] != ‘\0’) ++j;
return j;
}

11/22/2022 3
Addresses and Pointers ( a brief)
■ int j = 5;
■ The unary operator & gives the address of its
operand.
■ Hence, &j is the address of j
■ & cannot be applied to expressions, constants, or
register variables.
■ Let &j be 1000.
■ Even by knowing this 1000, if you do not know that
the value at the address is an integer, you can not
retrieve 5.
■ So, along with address, we need the type of the
value located at the address.
Pointers

■ Pointer is a variable that contains the address of a


variable.
■ int *p; /*declaration of a pointer*/
■ p is an integer pointer.
■ That is, value of p is an address. And at that address an
integer is stored.
■ The unary operator * is the indirection or dereferencing
operator; when applied to a pointer, it accesses the
object that is pointed by the pointer.
Pointers, an example
❑ int x = 1, y = 2;
int *ip; /* ip is a pointer to int */
ip = &x; /* ip now points to x */
y = *ip; /* y is now 1 */
*ip = 0; /* x is now 0 */

x Name
ip
1000 1 Value
1024 1000 Address
Pointers
❑ void swap (int *, int *);
main( )
■Thisis the correct
{
int j = 10, k = 20; way of writing a swap
swap(&j, &k); function.
printf(“%d %d”, j, k);
}
void swap(int *a, int *b)
{
int t;
t = *a, *a = *b, *b = t;
}
Pointers and Arrays

■ Any operation that can be achieved by array


subscripting can also be done with pointers.
■ int a[10] = {1,2,3,4,5};
int *ip;

ip = a;
ip[0] = 10; /* is same as a[0] = 10 */
*(ip + 5) = 20; /* same as ip[5] = 20 */
▪ When you say, ip + 5 it is indeed ip +5*sizeof(int)
This is called pointer (address) arithmetic.
Files
When dealing with files, there are two types of files you should know about:

1. Text files
2. Binary files

In C, you can perform four major operations on


files, either text or binary:
1. Creating a new file
2. Opening an existing file
3. Closing a file
4. Reading from and writing information to a file
Opening a file - for creation and edit

FILE *fptr;

ptr = fopen("fileopen","mode");

fopen("E:\\cprogram\\newprogram.txt","w");

mode can be w, a, r,
int fputc(int char, FILE *pointer)

int main()
{
int i = 0;
FILE *fp = fopen("output.txt","w");
if (fp == NULL)
return 0;
char string[] = "good bye", received_string[20];
for (i = 0; string[i]!='\0'; i++)
fputc(string[i], fp);
fclose(fp);
fp = fopen("output.txt","r");
fgets(received_string,20,fp);
printf("%s", received_string);
fclose(fp);
return 0;
}
The fprintf( ) function is used to write set of
characters into file.
int fprintf(FILE *stream, const char *format [, argument, ...])

#include <stdio.h>

main()

FILE *fp;

fp = fopen("file.txt", "w"); //opening file

fprintf(fp, "Hello file by fprintf...\n"); //writing data into file

fclose(fp); //closing file

}
The fscanf( ) function is used to read set of characters from file.
It reads a word from the file and returns EOF at the end of file.
int fscanf(FILE *stream, const char *format [, argument, ...])

1. #include <stdio.h>
2. main(){
3. FILE *fp;
4. char buff[255];//creating char array to store data of file
5. fp = fopen("file.txt", "r");
6. while(fscanf(fp, "%s", buff)!=EOF){
7. printf("%s ", buff );
8. }
9. fclose(fp);
10. }
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>

int main()
{
int num;
FILE *fptr;
fptr = fopen("C:\\program.txt","w");

if(fptr == NULL)
{
printf("Error!");
exit(1);
}

printf("Enter num: ");


scanf("%d",&num);

fprintf(fptr,"%d",num);
fclose(fptr);

return 0;
}
1. fgetc()– This function is used to read a single character from the file.
2. fgets()– This function is used to read strings from files.
3. fscanf()– This function is used to read formatted input from a file.

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

// Driver code
int main()
{
FILE* ptr;
char ch;
ptr = fopen("test.txt", "r");
if (NULL == ptr) {
printf("file can't be opened \n");
}
do {
ch = fgetc(ptr);
printf("%c", ch);
} while (ch != EOF);
fclose(ptr);
return 0;
}
{
FILE *fptr;

// Open a file in read mode


fptr = fopen("filename.txt", "r");

// Store the content of the file


char myString[100];

// Read the content and store it inside myString


fgets(myString, 100, fptr);

// Print the file content


printf("%s", myString);

// Close the file


fclose(fptr);
}

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