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# fgets

From cppreference.com
< c‎ | io

Defined in header `<stdio.h>` |  |
char *fgets( char *str, int count, FILE *stream ); |  | (until C99)
char *fgets( char *restrict str, int count, FILE *restrict stream ); |  | (since C99)

Reads at most count - 1 characters from the given file stream and stores them in `str`. The produced character string is always null-terminated. Parsing stops if end-of-file occurs or a newline character is found, in which case `str` will contain that newline character.

### [edit] Parameters

str | - | string to read the characters to
count | - | the length of `str`
stream | - | file stream to read the data from

### [edit] Return value

`str` on success, NULL on failure.

If the failure has been caused by end-of-file condition, additionally sets the eof indicator (see feof()) on `stream`. If the failure has been caused by some other error, sets the error indicator (see ferror()) on `stream`.

### [edit] Example

fgets with error checking

Run this code

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

    int main(void)
    {
        FILE* tmpf = tmpfile();
        fputs("Alan Turing\n", tmpf);
        fputs("John von Neumann\n", tmpf);
        fputs("Alonzo Church\n", tmpf);

        rewind(tmpf);

        char buf[8];
        while (fgets(buf, sizeof buf, tmpf) != NULL)
              printf("\"%s\"\n", buf);

        /* Test reason for reaching NULL. */
        if (feof(tmpf))          /* if failure caused by end-of-file condition */
           puts("End of file reached");
        else if (ferror(tmpf))   /* if failure caused by some other error      */
             {
                perror("fgets()");
                fprintf(stderr,"fgets() failed in file %s at line # %d\n", __FILE__,__LINE__-9);
                exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
             }

        return EXIT_SUCCESS;
    }

Output:

    "Alan Tu"
    "ring
    "
    "John vo"
    "n Neuma"
    "nn
    "
    "Alonzo "
    "Church
    "
    End of file reached

### [edit] References

- C11 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:2011):

  - 7.21.7.2 The fgets function (p: 331)

- C99 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1999):

  - 7.19.7.2 The fgets function (p: 296)

- C89/C90 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1990):

  - 4.9.7.2 The fgets function

### [edit] See also

scanffscanfsscanfscanf_sfscanf_ssscanf_s (C11)(C11)(C11) | reads formatted input from stdin, a file stream or a buffer (function) [edit]
getsgets_s (until C11)(since C11) | reads a character string from `stdin` (function) [edit]
fputs | writes a character string to a file stream (function) [edit]
C++ documentation for fgets

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