Thread: Use of EOF

I am a newbie at C programming.

In a C script which counts characters in a given input I used EOF to detect the end of input but it didn't work. the input keeps being displayed on the screen and no output is provided. Enter or Ctrl + C don't do!

The script is as given below:

#include <stdio.h>

main()
{
int nc;
nc = 0;
while (getchar() != EOF)
++nc;
printf("%d\n", nc);
}

How am I going to make it detect the EOF? What is EOF exactly?

Post your program code in [code][/code] bbcode tags.

Originally Posted by Arjit

How am I going to make it detect the EOF? What is EOF exactly?

Read the FAQ on Definition of EOF and how to use it effectively.

If you want output aswell, add putchar(c) command into you while loop. Also, you'll need a variable for that.

Code:

int c;
while((c = getchar()) != EOF)
{
   putchar(c);
   nc++;
}

EOF is declared in stdio.h to signal an end of file. I has an value of -1, since normal ascii characters have values 0-255 (extended set).

This also answers a question why shouldnt you store characters from input to a character type variable - because of EOF. A char variable can contain values -128 till 127(not 255), thats why int is used.