Thread: how to be a good C programmer?

Originally Posted by Adak

Getting away from using parts of the language that have been found troublesome - like scanf() for user input, or gets(). Maybe not the first month out, but as soon as you understand their deficiencies, switch to the better alternatives.

Just to know... which are the alternatives?

Isn't it good something like:

char s[5];
...
scanf("%4s",s);

Almost always no. I use scanf only for little utility / fun programs.

You want fgets(), because it takes away the "brittleness" of scanf *and* the newline char whenever you hit the enter key with entry of some value from the user.

Scanf() is definitely "down and dirty", and has proven to be WAY down and VERY dirty, indeed.

Vs is good to start with