how do I count the lines in a text file?

Hi folks,
how would I count the lines in a file?
I want to get a new unique ID# for a simple DB by counting the records and assigning this number + 1 for each new record.
The lines in the .txt file are as follows

<TABLE><TABLE BORDER><TH> ID#<TH> FIRST NAME<TH> LAST NAME<TH> TEST 1 <TR>
<tr><td>0<td>donkey<td><td>derby<td><td>12<tr>

I have tried this but it doesn't work

FILE *r ;
r = fopen(datafile,"a"); // I'll error check later if
//I get this bit to work first

while((inchar=fgetc(r))!=EOF){
if(inchar == '\n')
linecount++ ;
}

linecount remains at 0 (the swine)

The function which printed the file is

fprintf(r,"%s%s%s%s%s%s%s%s\n",b,d,g,f,h,i,c,j);

so there is a \n in there to be counted.
I have tried numerous other ways from the C board archives
but nothing works!
what am I doing wrong?
any help would be greatly appreciated.

A couple of things:
- use code tags
- try opening with "a+"
- read more about fopen() here.

gg

You can try something like that:

Code:

---

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

#define PATH "C:\\test.txt"

int main(void) {
        FILE *fpIn;
        int lines = 0;
        char buf[BUFSIZ];

        if ((fpIn = fopen(PATH,"r")) == NULL) {
                perror ("Could not open file: ");
                return EXIT_FAILURE;
        }

        while (fgets(buf,sizeof(buf),fpIn) != NULL)
                lines++;

        printf("This file contains %d lines\n",lines);
        return 0;
}

---

Code:

---

while (fgets(buf,sizeof(buf),fpIn) != NULL)
                lines++;

---

This code could catch you out, as fgets() isn't guaranteed to get you a line of data. You'd need to check the last character of the buffer to be sure. But if you do this, be mindful of what happens at the end of a file that doesn't end with a newline character.

well I never, a+ did the trick!
I spent hours trying get it to work and I knew I must be close.
I settled on the following bit of code since it's nice and simple and seem's to do the trick ie prints out the HTML table with a unique ID.
sorry I forgot code tags , didn't think that my ity bity snitch of code deserved code tags!

file mode rt also works!

thanks for all the help. Here's the piece of code I'm using.
(with code tags...I hope) It takes input from a form and enters it into a HTML table. It's very simple but I can work it up to what I really need with time and effort.

Code:

---


 
void process2(char *s)
{
int ID=0;
int header_print =0;
char full_entry1[1000];
 
char name_first[300];
char name_last[300];
char test1_score[300];
char test2_score[300];
char test3_score[300];
char test4_score[300];

int linecount =0 ;
int inchar;

FILE *r ;

r = fopen(datafile,"rt");
 if(r == NULL)
 {
 printf("%s%c%c\n",  "Content-Type:text/html;charset=iso-8859-1",13,10);
 printf("<P><EM>Unable to open data file</EM>");
 }


 while((inchar=fgetc(r))!=EOF)
 {
 if(inchar == '\n')
 linecount++;
 }

 ID = linecount;

 header_print=linecount;
  if(header_print<1)
  {
  char b[] = "<TABLE> <TABLE BORDER >";
  char d[] = "<TH> ID#";
  char f[] = "<TH> LAST NAME";
  char g[] = "<TH> FIRST NAME";
  char h[] = "<TH> TEST 1 SCORE";
  char i[] = "<TH> TEST 2 SCORE";
  char c[] = "<TH> TEST 3 SCORE";
  char j[] = "<TH> TEST 4 SCORE<TR>";
  fprintf(r,"\n%s%s%s%s%s%s%s%s",b,d,g,f,h,i,c,j);  // prints table headers
  }

 else
 {
GetStringComponent("name_first", s, name_first);
GetStringComponent("name_last", s, name_last);
GetStringComponent("test1_score", s, test1_score);

 //must execute once from here to print headers, ok then
fprintf(r, "\n<tr><td align=""center"" >%d<td>%s<td>%s<td><td>%s<tr>",ID,name_first,name_last,test1_score  );
                      // doesn't work
fclose(r);


 }

return;

}

---

hey, the tags worked.

Thanks all.