Chapter 13: Strings

Chapter 13

Strings

1 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

String Literals
• A string literal is a sequence of characters enclosed within double
quotes: "When you come to a fork in the road, take it."
• String literals may contain escape sequences. For example, each
\n character in the string
"Candy\nIs dandy\nBut liquor\nIs quicker.\n --Ogden Nash\n"
causes the cursor to advance to the next line: Candy
Is dandy
But liquor
Is quicker.
--Ogden Nash

• The backslash character (\) can be used to continue a string

literal from one line to the next:
printf("When you come to a fork in the road, take it. \
--Yogi Berra");
2 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

How String Literals Are Stored

• Strings are arrays of characters in which a special
character—the null character—marks the end.
• When a C compiler encounters a string literal of
length n in a program, it sets aside n + 1 bytes of
memory for the string.
• This memory will contain the characters in the
string, plus one extra character—the null
character—to mark the end of the string.
• The null character is a byte whose bits are all zero,
so it’s represented by the \0 escape sequence.
3 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

How String Literals Are Stored

• A string literal is stored as an ak, the compiler
treats it as a pointer of type char *.
• The string literal "abc" is stored as an array of
four characters:
a b c \0

• The string "" is stored as a single null character:

\0

4 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Operations on String Literals

• We can use a string literal wherever C allows a
char * pointer:
char *p;
p = "abc";
• This assignment makes p point to the first
character of the string.

a b c \0

5 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Operations on String Literals

• String literals can be subscripted:
char ch;
ch b
ch = "abc"[1];
The new value of ch will be the letter b.
• A function that converts a number between 0 and
15 into the equivalent hex digit:
char digit_to_hex_char(int digit)
{
return "0123456789ABCDEF"[digit];
}

6 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Operations on String Literals

• Attempting to modify a string literal causes
undefined behavior:
char *p = "abc";
*p = 'd'; /*** WRONG ***/
• A program that tries to change a string literal may
crash or behave erratically.

7 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

String Literals versus Character Constants

• A string literal containing a single character isn’t
the same as a character constant.
– "a" is represented by a pointer.
– 'a' is represented by an integer.
• A legal call of printf:
printf("\n");
• An illegal call:
printf('\n'); /*** WRONG ***/

8 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

String Variables
• Any one-dimensional array of characters can be
used to store a string.
• A string must be terminated by a null character.
• Difficulties with this approach:
– It can be hard to tell whether an array of characters is
being used as a string.
– String-handling functions must be careful to deal
properly with the null character.
– Finding the length of a string requires searching for the
null character.

9 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

String Variables
• If a string variable needs to hold 80 characters, it
must be declared to have length 81:
#define STR_LEN 80 Defining a macro and then
… adding 1 separately is a common
practice.
char str[STR_LEN+1];
• Adding 1 to the desired length allows room for
the null character at the end of the string.
• The actual length of a string depends on the
position of the terminating null character.
• An array of STR_LEN + 1 characters can hold
strings with lengths between 0 and STR_LEN.
10 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Initializing a String Variable

• A string variable can be initialized at the same
time it’s declared:
char date1[8] = "June 14";
• The compiler will automatically add a null
character so that date1 can be used as a string:
date1 J u n e 1 4 \0

• "June 14" is not a string literal in this context.

• Instead, C views it as an abbreviation for an array
initializer.
11 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Initializing a String Variable

• If the initializer is too short to fill the string
variable, the compiler adds extra null characters:
char date2[9] = "June 14";
Appearance of date2:

date2 J u n e 1 4 \0 \0

12 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Initializing a String Variable

• An initializer for a string variable can’t be longer
than the variable, but it can be the same length:
char date3[7] = "June 14";
• There’s no room for the null character, so the
compiler makes no attempt to store one:
date3 J u n e 1 4

13 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Initializing a String Variable

• The declaration of a string variable may omit its
length, in which case the compiler computes it:
char date4[] = "June 14";
• The compiler sets aside eight characters for
date4, enough to store the characters in "June
14" plus a null character.
date4 J u n e 1 4 \0
• Omitting the length of a string variable is
especially useful if the initializer is long, since
computing the length by hand is error-prone.
14 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
 Chapter 13: Strings

Character Arrays versus Character Pointers

In the array
version, the
In the array characters
version, date • The declaration stored in
is an array date can be
name. char date[] = "June 14";
modified.
declares date to be an array,
• The similar-looking In the pointer
version,
In the pointer char *date = "June 14"; date points
version, date
declares date to be a pointer. to a string
is a variable literal that
that can point shouldn’t be
to other modified.
strings.
15 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Character Arrays versus Character Pointers

• The declaration
char *p;
does not allocate space for a string.
• Before we can use p as a string, it must point to an
array of characters.
• One possibility is to make p point to a string variable:
char str[STR_LEN+1], *p;
p = str;
• Another possibility is to make p point to a
dynamically allocated string.
16 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Character Arrays versus Character Pointers

• Using an uninitialized pointer variable as a
string is a serious error.
• An attempt at building the string "abc":
char *p;
p[0] = 'a'; /*** WRONG ***/
p[1] = 'b'; /*** WRONG ***/
p[2] = 'c'; /*** WRONG ***/
p[3] = '\0'; /*** WRONG ***/
• Since p hasn’t been initialized, this causes
undefined behavior.
17 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Reading and Writing Strings

• Writing a string is easy using either printf or
puts.
• Reading a string is a bit harder, because the input
may be longer than the string variable into which
it’s being stored.
• To read a string in a single step, we can use either
scanf or gets.
• As an alternative, we can read strings one
character at a time.

18 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Writing Strings Using printf and puts

• The %s conversion specification allows printf
to write a string:
char str[] = "Are we having fun yet?";
printf("%s\n", str);
The output will be
Are we having fun yet?

• printf writes the characters in a string one by

one until it encounters a null character.

19 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Writing Strings Using printf and puts

• To print part of a string, use the conversion
specification %.ps.
• p is the number of characters to be displayed.
• The statement
printf("%.6s\n", str);
will print
Are we

20 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Writing Strings Using printf and puts

• The %ms conversion will display a string in a field
of size m.
• If the string has fewer than m characters, it will be
right-justified within the field.
• To force left justification instead, we can put a
minus sign in front of m.
• The statement
printf("%25s\n", str);
will print Are we having fun yet?

21 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Writing Strings Using printf and puts

• The m and p values can be used in combination.
• A conversion specification of the form %m.ps
causes the first p characters of a string to be
displayed in a field of size m.
printf("%25.6s\n", str);
Are we

printf("%-25.6s\n", str);
Are we

22 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Writing Strings Using printf and puts

• printf isn’t the only function that can write
strings.
• The C library also provides puts:
puts(str);
• After writing a string, puts always writes an
additional new-line character.
Are we having fun yet?

23 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Reading Strings Using scanf and gets

• The %s conversion specification allows scanf to
read a string into a character array:
scanf("%s", str);
• str is treated as a pointer, so there’s no need to
put the & operator in front of str.
• When scanf is called, it skips white space, then
reads characters and stores them in str until it
encounters a white-space character.
• scanf always stores a null character at the end
of the string.
24 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Reading Strings Using scanf and gets

• scanf won’t usually read a full line of input.
• A new-line character will cause scanf to stop
reading, but so will a space or tab character.
• To read an entire line of input, we can use gets.
• Properties of gets:
– Doesn’t skip white space before starting to read input.
– Reads until it finds a new-line character.
– Discards the new-line character instead of storing it; the
null character takes its place.

25 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Reading Strings Using scanf and gets

• Consider the following program fragment:
char sentence[SENT_LEN+1];
printf("Enter a sentence:\n");
scanf("%s", sentence);
• Suppose that after the prompt
Enter a sentence:
the user enters the line
To C, or not to C: that is the question.
• scanf will store the string "To" in sentence.

26 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Reading Strings Using scanf and gets

• Suppose that we replace scanf by gets:
gets(sentence);
• When the user enters the same input as before,
gets will store the string
" To C, or not to C: that is the question."
in sentence.

27 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Reading Strings Character by Character

• Suppose we need a function that (1) doesn’t skip
white-space characters, (2) stops reading at the first
new-line character (which isn’t stored in the string),
and (3) discards extra characters.
• A prototype for the function:
int read_line(char str[], int n);
• If the input line contains more than n characters,
read_line will discard the additional characters.
• read_line will return the number of characters it
stores in str.

28 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Reading Strings Character by Character

• read_line consists primarily of a loop that calls
getchar to read a character and then stores the character
in str, provided that there’s room left: ch has int type
int read_line(char str[], int n) rather than char
{ type because
int ch, i = 0; getchar returns an
int value.
while ((ch = getchar()) != '\n')
if (i < n)
str[i++] = ch;
str[i] = '\0'; /* terminates string */
return i; /* number of characters stored */
} put a null character at the
end of an input string.
29 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Accessing the Characters in a String

• Since strings are stored as arrays, we can use
subscripting to access the characters in a string.
• A function that counts the number of spaces in a
string:
int count_spaces(const char s[])
{ To process every
int count = 0, i; character in a string s,
we can set up a loop
for (i = 0; s[i] != '\0'; i++) that increments a
if (s[i] == ' ') counter i and selects
count++; characters via the
expression s[i].
return count;
}
30 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Accessing the Characters in a String

• A version that uses pointer arithmetic instead of
array subscripting :
int count_spaces(const char *s)
{
int count = 0;
for (; *s != '\0'; s++)
if (*s == ' ')
count++;
return count;
}

31 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Using the C String Library

• Some programming languages provide operators
that can copy strings, compare strings, concatenate
strings, select substrings, and the like.
• C’s operators, in contrast, are essentially useless
for working with strings.
• Strings are treated as arrays in C, so they’re
restricted in the same ways as arrays.
• In particular, they can’t be copied or compared
using operators.

32 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Using the C String Library

• Direct attempts to copy or compare strings will fail.
• Copying a string into a character array using the =
operator is not possible:
char str1[10], str2[10];
…
str1 = "abc"; /*** WRONG ***/
str2 = str1; /*** WRONG ***/
Using an array name as the left operand of = is illegal.
• Initializing a character array using = is legal, though:
char str1[10] = "abc";
In this context, = is not the assignment operator.
33 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Using the C String Library

• Attempting to compare strings using a relational
or equality operator is legal but won’t produce
the desired result:
if (str1 == str2) … /*** WRONG ***/
• This statement compares str1 and str2 as
pointers.
• Since str1 and str2 have different addresses,
the expression str1 == str2 must have the
value 0.

34 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Using the C String Library

• The C library provides a rich set of functions for
performing operations on strings.
• Programs that need string operations should
contain the following line:
#include <string.h>
• In subsequent examples, assume that str1 and
str2 are character arrays used as strings.
char str1[10], str2[10];

35 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strcpy (String Copy) Function

• Prototype for the strcpy function:
char *strcpy(char *s1, const char *s2);
• strcpy copies the string s2 into the string s1.
– To be precise, we should say “strcpy copies the
string pointed to by s2 into the array pointed to by
s1.”
• strcpy returns s1 (a pointer to the destination
string).

36 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strcpy (String Copy) Function

• A call of strcpy that stores the string "abcd"
in str2:
strcpy(str2, "abcd");
str2 a b c d \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0

• A call that copies the contents of str2 into

str1:
strcpy(str1, str2);

str1 a b c d \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0

37 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strcpy (String Copy) Function

• Calling the strncpy function is a safer, albeit
slower, way to copy a string.
• strncpy has a third argument that limits the
number of characters that will be copied.
• A call of strncpy that copies str2 into str1:
strncpy(str1, str2, sizeof(str1));
• A safer way to use strncpy:
strncpy(str1, str2, sizeof(str1) - 1);
str1[sizeof(str1)-1] = '\0';

38 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strlen (String Length) Function

• Prototype for the strlen function:
size_t strlen(const char *s);
• size_t is a typedef name that represents one of C’s
unsigned integer types.
• strlen returns the length of a string s, not including the
null character.
• Examples:
int len;
len = strlen("abc"); /* len is now 3 */
len = strlen(""); /* len is now 0 */
strcpy(str1, "abc");
len = strlen(str1); /* len is now 3 */

39 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
 Chapter 13: Strings

The strcat (String Concatenation) Function

• Prototype for the strcat function:
char *strcat(char *s1, const char *s2);
• strcat appends the contents of the string s2 to
the end of the string s1.
• It returns s1 (a pointer to the resulting string).

40 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
 Chapter 13: Strings

The strcat (String Concatenation) Function

• strcat examples:
strcpy(str1, "abc");
str1 a b c \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0

strcat(str1, "def");
str1 a b c d e f \0 \0 \0 \0

/* str1 now contains "abcdef" */

41 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
 Chapter 13: Strings

The strcat (String Concatenation) Function

• strcat examples:
strcpy(str1, "abc");
str1 a b c \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0

strcpy(str2, "def");
str2 d e f \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0
strcat(str1, str2);
str1 a b c d e f \0 \0 \0 \0

/* str1 now contains "abcdef" */

42 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
 Chapter 13: Strings

The strcat (String Concatenation) Function

strcpy(str1, "abc");
str1 a b c \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0

strcpy(str2, "def");
str2 d e f \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0 \0
strcat(str1, strcat(str2, "ghi"));
str2 d e f g h i \0 \0 \0 \0

str1 a b c d e f g h i \0

43 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
 Chapter 13: Strings

The strcat (String Concatenation) Function

• strcat(str1, str2) causes undefined
behavior if the str1 array isn’t long enough to
accommodate the characters from str2.
• Example:
char str1[6] = "abc";

str1 a b c \0 \0 \0

strcat(str1, "def"); /*** WRONG ***/

• str1 is limited to six characters, causing
strcat to write past the end of the array.
44 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
 Chapter 13: Strings

The strcat (String Concatenation) Function

• The strncat function is a safer but slower
version of strcat.
• Like strncpy, it has a third argument that
limits the number of characters it will copy.
• A call of strncat:
strncat(str1, str2, sizeof(str1) - strlen(str1) - 1);
• strncat will terminate str1 with a null
character, which isn’t included in the third
argument.

45 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strcmp (String Comparison) Function

• Prototype for the strcmp function:
int strcmp(const char *s1, const char *s2);
• strcmp compares the strings s1 and s2,
returning a value less than, equal to, or greater
than 0, depending on whether s1 is less than,
equal to, or greater than s2.

46 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strcmp (String Comparison) Function

• Testing whether str1 is less than str2:
if (strcmp(str1, str2) < 0) /* is str1 < str2? */
…
• Testing whether str1 is less than or equal to
str2:
if (strcmp(str1, str2) <= 0) /* is str1 <= str2? */
…
• By choosing the proper operator (<, <=, >, >=,
==, !=), we can test any possible relationship
between str1 and str2.

47 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strcmp (String Comparison) Function

• strcmp considers s1 to be less than s2 if either
one of the following conditions is satisfied:
– The first i characters of s1 and s2 match, but the
(i+1)st character of s1 is less than the (i+1)st character
of s2.
– All characters of s1 match s2, but s1 is shorter than
s2.

48 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

The strcmp (String Comparison) Function

• As it compares two strings, strcmp looks at the
numerical codes for the characters in the strings.
• Some knowledge of the underlying character set is
helpful to predict what strcmp will do.
• Important properties of ASCII:
– A–Z, a–z, and 0–9 have consecutive codes.
– All upper-case letters are less than all lower-case
letters.
– Digits are less than letters.
– Spaces are less than all printing characters.

49 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Arrays of Strings
• There is more than one way to store an array of
strings.
• One option is to use a two-dimensional array of
characters, with one string per row:
char planets[][8] = {"Mercury", "Venus", "Earth",
"Mars", "Jupiter", "Saturn",
"Uranus", "Neptune", "Pluto"};

• The number of rows in the array can be omitted,

but we must specify the number of columns.

50 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Arrays of Strings
• Unfortunately, the planets array contains a fair
bit of wasted space (extra null characters):

51 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Arrays of Strings
• Most collections of strings will have a mixture of
long strings and short strings.
• What we need is a ragged array, whose rows can
have different lengths.
• We can simulate a ragged array in C by creating
an array whose elements are pointers to strings:
char *planets[] = {"Mercury", "Venus", "Earth",
"Mars", "Jupiter", "Saturn",
"Uranus", "Neptune", "Pluto"};

52 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Arrays of Strings
• This small change has a dramatic effect on how
planets is stored:

53 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Arrays of Strings
• To access one of the planet names, all we need do
is subscript the planets array.
• Accessing a character in a planet name is done in
the same way as accessing an element of a two-
dimensional array.
• A loop that searches the planets array for
strings beginning with the letter M:
for (i = 0; i < 9; i++)
if (planets[i][0] == 'M')
printf("%s begins with M\n", planets[i]);

54 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Command-Line Arguments
• When we run a program, we’ll often need to
supply it with information.
• This may include a file name or a switch that
modifies the program’s behavior.
• Examples of the UNIX ls command:
ls
ls –l
ls -l remind.c

55 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Command-Line Arguments
• Command-line information is available to all
programs, not just operating system commands.
• To obtain access to command-line arguments,
main must have two parameters:
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
…
}
• Command-line arguments are called program
parameters in the C standard.

56 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Command-Line Arguments
• argc (“argument count”) is the number of
command-line arguments.
• argv (“argument vector”) is an array of pointers
to the command-line arguments (stored as strings).
• argv[0] points to the name of the program,
while argv[1] through argv[argc-1] point
to the remaining command-line arguments.
• argv[argc] is always a null pointer—a special
pointer that points to nothing.
– The macro NULL represents a null pointer.

57 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Command-Line Arguments
• If the user enters the command line
ls -l remind.c
then argc will be 3, and argv will have the
following appearance:

58 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Command-Line Arguments
• Since argv is an array of pointers, accessing
command-line arguments is easy.
• Typically, a program that expects command-line
arguments will set up a loop that examines each
argument in turn.
• One way to write such a loop is to use an integer
variable as an index into the argv array:
int i;
for (i = 1; i < argc; i++)
printf("%s\n", argv[i]);
59 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.
All rights reserved.
Chapter 13: Strings

Command-Line Arguments
• Another technique is to set up a pointer to
argv[1], then increment the pointer repeatedly:
char **p;
for (p = &argv[1]; *p != NULL; p++)
printf("%s\n", *p);

60 Copyright © 2008 W. W. Norton & Company.

All rights reserved.