Help with a book example: binary files

Hi, I've been going through the book "C++ Without Fear" by Brian Overland and I've come across a problem with one of the examples. It's about opening a binary file, writing data to it, and closing it. My problem is, no matter what I enter for the filename, the program can't open the file. Any help would be much appreciated. Here's the example straight out of the book:

Code:

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// writebin.cpp : Defines the entry point for the console application.
//

#include "stdafx.h"
#include <iostream>
#include <fstream>
using namespace std;

int get_int(int default_value);
char name[20];

int main(){
        char filename[81];
        int n;
        int age;
        int recsize = sizeof(name) + sizeof(int);

        cout << "Enter file name: ";
        cin.getline(filename, 80);

        //Open file for binary read and write.

        fstream fbin(filename, ios::binary | ios::in |
                ios::out);
        if(!fbin){
                cout << "Could not open file " << filename;
                return -1;
        }
       
        // Get record number to write to.

        cout << "Enter file record number: ";
        n = get_int(0);

        // Get data from end user.

        cout << "Enter name: ";
        cin.getline(name, 19);
        cout << "Enter age: ";
        age = get_int(0);

        // Write data to the file.

        fbin.seekp(n * recsize);
        fbin.write(name, 20);
        fbin.write(reinterpret_cast<char*>(&age),
                sizeof(int));
        fbin.close();
        return 0;
}

// Get integer function
// Get an integer from keyboard; return default
// value if user enters 0-length string.
//
int get_int(int default_value) {
        char s[81];

        cin.getline(s, 80);
        if(strlen(s) == 0)
                return default_value;
        return atoi(s);
}

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If you just type in 'bindata.dat' file, the program is going to look for that file in the directory the program is residing in. If it's elsewhere, you'll need the exact and complete pathway (ie. c:\\windows\\desktop\\bindata.dat)

The previous examples in the book dealt with files in text format, as opposed to binary format, and used the same method for opening a file. It also created the file to be opened so there was no need to create it beforehand for the program to open it. For example, if I entered stupidfile at the prompt, it created a file named stupidfile in the directory of the program. Or if I specified a path, C:\windows\desktop\stupidfile, it created 'stupidfile on the desktop. This is the relevant code block from the previous examples which ran without a hitch, it's very similar to my original binary format one. The binary format version won't accept anything for a filename and I'm not sure how to create a new .dat file beforehand to see if it can be opened.

Code:

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        cout << "Enter the filename and press ENTER: ";
        cin.getline(filename, 80);


        ofstream fout(filename);
       
        while(1) {
        cout << "Enter the line of text to be saved and press ENTER\n";
        cout << "or press ENTER to exit: ";
        cin.getline(usertext, 900);
        if(strlen(usertext) == 0){
                break;
        }
        if(!fout) {
                cout << "File" << filename;
                cout << " could not be opened";
                return -1;
        }

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Add ios::app to the list of flags you're passing to the constructor.

EDIT: Note this you will need to rewind to read the file after opening.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rags_to_riches

Add ios::app to the list of flags you're passing to the constructor.

EDIT: Note this you will need to rewind to read the file after opening.

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Ahh it worked! Thank you, thank you : ) I'm not sure why the author left that out of the code, or more importantly why it works but I'm sure I'll get there eventually. Thanks again!