Question about arrays.

[eurus]

I have a two dimensional array that will be taking in about 38 numbers and 2 letters randomly.


I allocate the memory for 20 columns and 20 lines and take in simple 1 digit numbers and two letters randomly.

How does the array deal with the letters getting scanned in as %d or is there a special way to store 2 characters in a int array?

Will the scanf store the letters as there acsii code?

[SlyMaelstrom]

In reality, you can't store a character in an integer array. You can store the ascii value of a character into an integer array, buy you'd have to cast it going in and coming out(if you want it read as a character).

If you simply did scanf("%d",&foo) where foo is a character any character value the user inputs simply wouldn't be read in.

[eurus]

Ok gotcha, so if I didn't know when the character was going to be coming in how would I cast it to take the acsii code for the two letters while still taking in the integers?

[SlyMaelstrom]

You can't. The only thing you can do is see if your printf failed. If it fails it means it didn't properly read into the variable. If it fails, you'll want to clear the file and try to read in again or try to read in a different datatype.

#include <stdio.h>

int main() 
{
  char foo;
  
  printf("Enter a character: ");

  if (scanf("%d",&foo))
     printf("scanf() succeeded");
  else
     printf("scanf() has failed");
  
  return 0;
}

Compile this and watch what happens. Then change the %d to %c and try again.

[eurus]

so should do something like

if(fscanf("%d", &array[i][j])

else(fscanf("%c", &array[i][j])

[SlyMaelstrom]

You really shouldn't use scanf() for this because it can be unsafe. This is because %d will read into characters if a decimal number was given. What it reads in is the ascii value and implicitly casts it.

#include <stdio.h>

int main() 
{
  char foo;
  
  scanf("%d",&foo);  // Enter the value 65 here
  printf("%c", foo);   // and get the value 'A' here

  return 0;
}

Compile this and enter 65.