Thread: Can someone please explain strings to me?

Originally posted by lithium
also never use:
strcpy
strcmp

or functions similar to those. instead use:
strncpy
strncmp

this will aviod buffer overflows (segmentation faults).

@lithium: Please explain how you get a buffer overflow from using strcmp().

For those that aren't aware, strncpy() isn't guaranteed to null terminate the array.

Code:

/*
 * The error here is that use programmer expected 
 * strncpy() to make s equal BBBB\0 or BBBBB\0.  
 * See the results below to see what actually happens.
 */

#include <string.h>
#include <stdio.h>

int main(void)
{
  char s[10] = "aaaaaaaa";
  puts(s);
  strncpy(s, "BBBBBBBB", 5);
  puts(s);
}

/* 
  Output:
  
  aaaaaaaa
  BBBBBaaa
  
  */