Reading Character at a time from a text file

Hi everyone, this is my first post so be nice!! ;)

I want to read from a text file and output single characters to an external device. I can access the file, read the whole string, and output the whole string to the device. But I really need to do it character at a time in a wee loop.

Here's the code I have so far;
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Code:

---

        if((textfile = fopen("temp.txt","r"))==NULL){
                printf("Error opening text file for reading\n");
                exit(0);
        }

        while((fscanf(textfile, "%s", line)!=EOF))
                {
               
                WriteFile(hCom, line, 1, &temp, NULL);
        }

        fclose(textfile);

---

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What it is doing is opening the file for reading and if it can't it'll output an error message. The it scans the file and outputs through the COM port.

The problem I am having is that I can't split the string up into individual characters. When I output the whole string to the device it, obviously, only receives the first character since I'm only sending a byte at a time.

Any help in splitting the string up would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

instead of scanf() use fgetc() , which gets only one char from the file.

are you meaning to just change the line

Code:

---

while((fscanf(textfile, "%s", line)!=EOF)){

---

to

Code:

---

while((fgetc(textfile, "%s", line)!=EOF)){

---

?

When I do that I get warnings saying;

warning C4020: 'fgetc' : too many actual parameters.

I should also say, even though it's only a warning, the external device receives no characters when I put fgetc() in.

You want something like this:

Code:

---

  int ch;
  ...
  while ((ch = fgetc (textfile)) != EOF) {/* do your thing */}

---

You need to find a good reference so you can look up the standard functions and see how to use them.

[QUOTE=Giania]are you meaning to just change the line

Code:

---

while((fscanf(textfile, "%s", line)!=EOF)){

---

to

Code:

---

while((fgetc(textfile, "%s", line)!=EOF)){

---

didn't you read that link I posted? It shows you how to use that function. :rolleyes:

There's something important in eerok's post:

Code:

---

  int ch;
  ...
  while ((ch = fgetc (textfile)) != EOF) {/* do your thing */}

---

EOF is an int value, not a char one, so you have to make ch an int to test against it. See the FAQ.

Thanks for that eerok. You mean like the Visual C++ help file? :P

I had a look and got it working. I'm not a programmer so my programming skills aint the best.

Anyway, here's what I did;

Code:

---

for(count=0;(count<size_of)&&((ch = fgetc (textfile)) != EOF)&& (ch != '\0');count++)
{
      buffer[0] = (char)ch;
        WriteFile(hCom, buffer , 1, &temp, NULL);  //write to the COM port.
        for (i=0;i<100000000;i++)  //just a delay so you can see the LEDs flashing
                {
                }
}

---

Thanks to all.

Code:

---

        for (i=0;i<100000000;i++)  //just a delay so you can see the LEDs flashing
                {
                }

---

http://faq.cprogramming.com/cgi-bin/...&id=1043284392

BTW, 100,000,000 is not guaranteed to fit into an int.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ancient Dragon

didn't you read that link I posted? It shows you how to use that function. :rolleyes:

---

Lol, no, I never noticed that that was a link. I thought you had just coloured the text to make it stand it!!! lol :)

I did say I was new here! ;)



Thanks for that Dwks. My code is still at the developing stage and still needs loads of tidying up. I'll keep the sleep function in mind when I come to write it so it works on any machine. Since the delay on my machine won't guarantee the same delay on others.

Thanks again