Input and Output
Functions

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Objectives

Having read this section you should have a clearer idea of
one of C's:

1. input functions, called scanf



2. output functions, called printf

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On The Run

Even with arithmetic you can't do very much other than write
programs that are the equivalent of a pocket calculator. The real
break through comes when you can read values into variables as
the program runs. Notice the important words here: "as the
program runs". You can already store values in variables using
assignment. That is:

a=100;

stores 100 in the variable a each time you run
the program, no matter what you do. Without some sort of input
command every program would produce exactly the same result every
time it was run. This would certainly make debugging easy! But in
practice, of course, we need programs to do different jobs each
time they are run. There are a number of different C input
commands, the most useful of which is the scanf
command. To read a single integer value into the variable called
a you would use:

scanf("%d",&a);

For the moment don't worry about what the %d
or the &a means - concentrate on the difference
between this and:

a=100;

When the program reaches the scanf statement
it pauses to give the user time to type something on the keyboard
and continues only when users press <Enter>, or
<Return>, to signal that he, or she, has finished
entering the value. Then the program continues with the new value
stored in a. In this way, each time the program
is run the user gets a chance to type in a different value to the
variable and the program also gets the chance to produce a
different result!

The final missing piece in the jigsaw is using the
printf function, the one we have already used to
print "Hello World", to print the value currently being stored in
a variable. To display the value stored in the variable
a you would use:

printf("The value stored in a is %d",a);

The %d, both in the case of
scanf and printf, simply lets the
compiler know that the value being read in, or printed out, is a

decimal integer - that is, a few digits but no decimal
point.

Note: the scanf function does not
prompt for an input. You should get in the habit of always using
a printf function, informing the user of the
program what they should type, before a scanf
function.

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Input and Output Functions in More Detail

One of the advantages of C is that essentially it is a
small language. This means that you can write a complete
description of the language in a few pages. It doesn't have many
keywords or data types for that matter. What makes C so
powerful is the way that these low-level facilities can be put
together to make higher level facilities.

The only problem with this is that C programmers have a
tendency to reinvent the wheel each time they want to go for a
ride. It is also possible to write C programs in a variety
of styles which depend on the particular tricks and devices that
a programmer chooses to use. Even after writing C for a
long time you will still find the occasionally construction which
makes you think, "I never thought of that!" or, "what is that
doing?"

One attempt to make C a more uniform language is the
provision of standard libraries of functions that perform common
tasks. We say standard but until the ANSI committee actually
produced a standard there was, and still is, some variation in
what the standard libraries contained and exactly how the
functions worked. Having said that we had better rush in quickly
with the reassurance that in practice the situation isn't that
bad and most of the functions that are used frequently really are
standard on all implementations. In particular the I/O functions
vary very little.

It is now time to look at exactly how scanf
and printf work and what they can do - you might
be surprised at just how complex they really are!

The original C specification did not include commands
for input and output. Instead the compiler writers were supposed
to implement library functions to suit their machines. In
practice all chose to implement printf and
scanf and after a while C programmers
started to think of them as if these functions were I/O keywords!
It sometimes helps to remember that they are functions on a par
with any other functions you may care to define. If you want to
you can provide your own implementations of

printf or scanf or any of the
other standard functions - we'll discover how later.

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printf

The printf (and scanf) functions
do differ from the sort of functions that you will created for
yourself in that they can take a variable number of

parameters. In the case of printf the
first parameter is always a string (c.f. "Hello World") but after
that you can include as many parameters of any type that you want
to. That is, the printf function is usually of
the form:

printf(string,variable,variable,variable...)

where the ... means you can carry on writing a list of
variables separated by commas as long as you want to. The
string is all-important because it specifies the type of
each variable in the list and how you want it printed. The
string is usually called the control string or the

format string. The way that this works is that
printf scans the string from left to right and
prints on the screen, or any suitable output device, any
characters it encounters - except when it reaches a
% character. The % character is a
signal that what follows it is a specification for how the next
variable in the list of variables should be printed.
printf uses this information to convert and
format the value that was passed to the function by the variable
and then moves on to process the rest of the control string and
anymore variables it might specify. For example:

printf("Hello World");

only has a control string and, as this contains no
% characters it results in Hello
World being displayed and doesn't need to display any
variable values. The specifier %d means
convert the next value to a signed decimal integer and
so:

printf("Total = %d",total);

will print Total = and then the value passed
by >total as a decimal integer.

If you are familiar other programming languages then you may
feel happy about the printf function because
something like:

printf("Total = %d",total);

looks like the sort of output command you might have used
before. For example, in BASIC you would write:

PRINT "Total = ",total

but the C view of output is at a lower level than you
might expect. The %d isn't just a format
specifier, it is a conversion specifier. It indicates the
data type of the variable to be printed and how that data type
should be converted to the characters that appear on the screen.
That is %d says that the next value to be printed
is a signed integer value (i.e. a value that would be stored in a
standard int variable) and this should be
converted into a sequence of characters (i.e. digits)
representing the value in decimal. If by some accident the
variable that you are trying to display happens to be a

float or a double then you will
still see a value displayed - but it will not correspond to the
actual value of the float or
double.

The reason for this is twofold.

1. The first difference is that an int uses two
   bytes to store its value, while a float uses four
   and a double uses eight. If you try to display a
   float or a double using
   %d then only the first two bytes of the value are
   actually used.



2. The second problem is that even if there wasn't a size
   difference ints, floats and
   doubles use a different binary representation and
   %d expects the bit pattern to be a simple signed
   binary integer.

This is all a bit technical, but that's in the nature of C. You can ignore these details as long as you remember
two important facts:

1. The specifier following % indicates the type
   of variable to be displayed as well as the format in which that
   the value should be displayed;



2. If you use a specifier with the wrong type of variable then
   you will see some strange things on the screen and the error
   often propagates to other items in the printf
   list.

If this seems complicated then I would agree but I should also
point out that the benefit is being able to treat what is stored
in a variable in a more flexible way than other languages allow.
Other languages never let on to the programmer that what is in
fact stored in a variable is a bit pattern, not the decimal value
that appears to be stored there when you use a

printf (or whatever) statement. Of course whether
you view this as an advantage depends on what you are trying to
do. It certainly brings you closer to the way the machine works.

You can also add an 'l' in front of a
specifier to mean a long form of the variable type and
h to indicate a short form (long and short

will be covered later in this course). For example,
%ld means a long integer variable (usually four
bytes) and %hd means short int.
Notice that there is no distinction between a four-byte
float and an eight-byte double.
The reason is that a float is automatically
converted to a double precision value when passed
to printf - so the two can be treated in the same
way. (In pre-ANSI all floats were converted to

double when passed to a function but this is no
longer true.) The only real problem that this poses is how to
print the value of a pointer? The answer is that you can use
%x to see the address in hex or
%o to see the address in octal. Notice that the
value printed is the segment offset and not the absolute address
- to understand what we am going on about you need to know
something about the structure of your processor.

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The % Format Specifiers

The % specifiers that you can use in ANSI C are:

      Usual variable type           Display

%c        char                     single character
%d (%i)   int                      signed integer
%e (%E)   float or double          exponential format
%f        float or double          signed decimal
%g (%G)   float or double          use %f or %e as required
%o        int                      unsigned octal value
%p        pointer                  address stored in pointer
%s        array of char            sequence of characters
%u        int                      unsigned decimal
%x (%X)   int                      unsigned hex value

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Formatting Your Output

The type conversion specifier only does what you ask of it - it
convert a given bit pattern into a sequence of characters that a
human can read. If you want to format the characters then you
need to know a little more about the printf
function's control string.

Each specifier can be preceded by a modifier

which determines how the value will be printed. The most general
modifier is of the form:

flag width.precision

The flag can be any of:

flag          meaning

  -         left justify
  +         always display sign
  space     display space if there is no sign
  0         pad with leading zeros
  #         use alternate form of specifier

The width specifies the number of
characters used in total to display the value and

precision indicates the number of
characters used after the decimal point.

For example, %10.3f will display the
float using ten characters with three digits
after the decimal point. Notice that the ten characters includes
the decimal point, and a - sign if there is one.
If the value needs more space than the
width specifies then the additional space
is used - width specifies the smallest
space that will be used to display the value. (This is quiet
reassuring, you won't be the first programmer whose program takes
hours to run but the output results can't be viewed because the
wrong format width has been specified!)

The specifier %-1Od will display an
int left justified in a ten character space. The
specifier %+5d will display an
int using the next five character locations and
will add a + or - sign to the
value.

The only complexity is the use of the #
modifier. What this does depends on which type of format it is
used with:

%#o    adds a leading 0 to the octal value
%#x    adds a leading 0x to the hex value
%#f or
%#e    ensures decimal point is printed
%#g    displays trailing zeros

Strings will be discussed later but for now remember: if you
print a string using the %s

specifier then all of the characters stored in the array up to
the first null will be printed. If you use a
width specifier then the
string will be right justified within the space. If
you include a precision specifier then
only that number of characters will be printed.

For example:

printf("%s,Hello")

will print Hello,

printf("%25s ,Hello")

will print 25 characters with Hello right
justified and

printf("%25.3s,Hello")

will print Hello right justified in a group of
25 spaces.

Also notice that it is fine to pass a constant value to
printf as in
printf("%s,Hello").

Finally there are the control codes:

\b       backspace
\f       formfeed
\n       new line
\r       carriage return
\t       horizontal tab
\'       single quote
\0       null

If you include any of these in the control string then the
corresponding ASCII control code is sent to the screen, or output
device, which should produce the effect listed. In most cases you
only need to remember \n for new line.

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scanf

Now that we have mastered the intricacies of
printf you should find scanf very
easy. The scanf function works in much the same
way as the printf. That is it has the general
form:

scanf(control
string,variable,variable,...)

In this case the control string
specifies how strings of characters, usually typed on the
keyboard, should be converted into values and stored in the
listed variables. However there are a number of important
differences as well as similarities between scanf
and printf.

The most obvious is that scanf has to change
the values stored in the parts of computers memory that is
associated with parameters (variables).

To understand this fully you will have to wait until we have
covered functions in more detail. But, just for now, bare with us
when we say to do this the scanf function has to
have the addresses of the variables rather than just their
values. This means that simple variables have to be passed with a
preceding >&. (Note for future
reference: There is no need to do this for strings stored in
arrays because the array name is already a pointer.)

The second difference is that the control
string has some extra items to cope with the
problems of reading data in. However, all of the conversion
specifiers listed in connection with printf can
be used with scanf.

The rule is that scanf processes the control
string from left to right and each time it reaches a specifier it
tries to interpret what has been typed as a value. If you input
multiple values then these are assumed to be separated by white
space - i.e. spaces, newline or tabs. This means you can
type:

3 4 5

or

3
4
5

and it doesn't matter how many spaces are included between
items. For example:

scanf("%d %d",&i,&j);

will read in two integer values into i and
j. The integer values can be typed on the same
line or on different lines as long as there is at least one white
space character between them.

The only exception to this rule is the %c

specifier which always reads in the next character typed no
matter what it is. You can also use a
width modifier in scanf.
In this case its effect is to limit the number of characters
accepted to the width.

For example:

scanf("%lOd",&i)

would use at most the first ten digits typed as the new value
for i.

There is one main problem with scanf function
which can make it unreliable in certain cases. The reason being
is that scanf tends to ignore white spaces, i.e.
the space character. If you require your input to contain spaces
this can cause a problem. Therefore for string data input
the function getstr() may well be more reliable
as it records spaces in the input text and treats them as an
ordinary characters.

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Custom Libraries

If you think printf and scanf
don't seem enough to do the sort of job that any modern
programmer expects to do, you would be right. In the early days
being able to print a line at a time was fine but today we expect
to be able to print anywhere on the screen at any time.

The point is that as far as standard C goes simple I/O
devices are stream-oriented - that is you send or get a
stream of characters without any notion of being able to move the
current position in the stream. If you want to move
backwards and forwards through the data then you need to use a

direct access file. In more simple terms, C doesn't
have a Tab(X,Y) or Locate(X,Y) function or command which moves
the cursor to the specified location! How are you ever going to
write your latest block buster game, let alone build your
sophisticated input screens?

Well you don't have to worry too much because although C may not define them as standard, all
C
implementations come with an extensive graphics/text function
library that allows you to do all of this and more. Such a
library isn't standard, however the principles are always the
same. The Borland and Microsoft offerings are usually considered
as the two facto standards.

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Summing It Up

Now that we have arithmetic, a way of reading values in and a way
of displaying them, it's possible to write a slightly more
interesting program than "Hello World". Not much more
interesting, it's true, but what do you expect with two
instructions and some arithmetic?

Let's write a program that adds two numbers together and
prints the result. (I told you it wasn't that much more
interesting!) Of course, if you want to work out something else
like Fahrenheit to centigrade, inches to centimetres or the size
of your bank balance, then that's up to you - the principle is
the same.

The program is a bit more complicated than you might expect,
but only because of the need to let the user know what is
happening:

#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
  int a,b,c;
  printf("\nThe first number is ");
  scanf("%d",&a);
  printf("The second number is ");
  scanf("%d",&b);
  c=a+b;
  printf("The answer is %d \n",c);
}

[program]

The first instruction declares three integer variables:
a, b and c. The
first two printf statements simply display
message on the screen asking the user for the values. The
scanf functions then read in the values from the
keyboard into a and b. These are
added together and the result in c is displayed
on the screen with a suitable message. Notice the way that you
can include a message in the printf statement
along with the value.

Type the program in, compile it and link it and the result
should be your first interactive program. Try changing it so that
it works out something a little more adventurous. Try changing
the messages as well. All you have to remember is that you cannot
store values or work out results greater than the range of an
integer variable or with a fractional part.