problem with strings

[echo49]

i'm trying to make this the variable 'blanks' filled with underscores so that both the length of the 'blanks' and the word are the same. but the compiler tells me that the assignment on the fourth line "makes an integer from pointer without cast". why does it return an integer in the first place?

theWord = "hello"
theLength = strlen(theWord);
char blanks[theLength];
for (i=0;i<theLength;i++) blanks[i] = "_";

[Tonto]

blanks[i] = '_';

Double quotes are string literals.
Single quotes are character literals.

char blanks[theLength];

Just know that that is a C99 extension.

[SlyMaelstrom]

Also, you should be using strcpy to assign "hello" to theWord if it isn't a declaration and initialization and don't forget you'll have to set blanks[theLength-1] equal to '\0' otherwise it's not technically a string.

[echo49]

slymaelstrom: thanks for the reminder about the '\0', it was displaying funny characters after my string until i put that in.

just so i know in the future, what's the difference between double quotes and single quotes?

[SlyMaelstrom]

just so i know in the future, what's the difference between double quotes and single quotes?

A null.

'a'     is     'a'
"a"     is     'a' + '\0'

[OnionKnight]

just so i know in the future, what's the difference between double quotes and single quotes?

A string literal returns the adress of the string whereas a character literal returns the character.

[quzah]

To be pedantic, neither one of them return anything.


Quzah.