Thread: Accepting an input of multiple formats

  1. #1
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    Accepting an input of multiple formats

    I'm trying to create a code that accepts a date, however I want to give the user the ability to enter the date as dd/mm/yyyy or dd-mm-yyyy. My code is below, I tried to use %*C but its a cheat method as you can enter anything between the numbers in the date

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


    int main ()
    {
    int dayA, monthA, yearA;


    printf("First date in format DD/MM/YYYY or DD-MM-YYYY: ");
    scanf("%d%*c%d%*c%d", &monthA, &dayA, &yearA);
    Last edited by amukadam1; 04-23-2020 at 03:34 PM.

  2. #2
    C++ Witch laserlight's Avatar
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    A simple approach is to read the input as a string, e.g., using fgets. Then, attempt to parse this string using sscanf with "%d/%d/%d" as the format specifier, checking that the return value is 3. If it isn't, attempt to parse the string using sscanf with "%d-%d-%d" as the format specifier, checking for a return value of 3. If it isn't, the input is invalid. Otherwise, check that the values read are within the expected ranges.

    Alternatively, you can consider using regular expressions, if such a library is available to you. For example, you could read the input as a string using fgets, remove the trailing newline, then attempt to parse it using regex with the PCRE pattern:
    Code:
    ^(\d{2}/\d{2}/\d{4})|(\d{2}-\d{2}-\d{4})$
    You would still need to validate the ranges though.
    Last edited by laserlight; 04-23-2020 at 04:02 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Bjarne Stroustrup (2000-10-14)
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