Funny characters being printed

Hi all! What i'm trying to do is to store the longest string being input into the program and print it out later. However when i print the longest string, it has some wierd characters at the back. Try inputing the string: there

Code:

---

#define MAX 50

int main()
{
  char input[MAX];
  char temp [MAX];
  char store[MAX]; //longest string stored here
  int length=0, i, option, choice;
  int maxLength = strlen(store);

  choice = 1
 
  switch(choice)
  {
      case 1: printf("Input = ");
              fgets(input, MAX, stdin);
             
              length = stringLength(input);
             
              //temp is needed to presevere what is stored in input
              for(i=0;i<=length;i++)
              {
                  temp[i] = input[i];
              }
             
              //convertString will manipulate the input
              if(convertString(input)==1)       
              {
                  if(length>=maxLength)
                  {
                      maxLength = length;
                      for(i=0;i<length;i++)
                          store[i] = temp[i];
                      option = 1;
                  }
              }
              fputs(store, stdout); //print out the string
              break;
        //the rest of case n default case goes here
  }
  return 0;
}
// find length of string in array
int stringLength(char str[])
{
  int i = 0;
  for(i=0; i<MAX; i++)
  {
      if(str[i]=='\n')
          return i;
  }
  return i;
}

---

Please pardon my silly mistakes I've made if any as I am quite new to C.

Are you sure this is all?

Code:

---

choice =1;

---

thats one, still this program doesnt compile.
edit: just woke up. :(

Its not a complete program, you have to include the header files, <stdio.h>, <ctype.h> and <string.h>. Also convertString is function i wrote, but it doesnt not have any effect on the main code, so I do not put it in. Also, you have to include the function prototype of function stringLength.

Sorry, cos I tot that most posts here only post snippets of the code.

Silly me, i just woke up so i just copied and pasted your program. Still choice is undeclared, and you need to provide your function in order to see whats really going on.

Code:

---

  char store[MAX]; //longest string stored here
  int length=0, i, option, choice;
  int maxLength = strlen(store);

---

Store hasn't been initialized yet so the result of strlen is indeterminate.
Those funny chars sound like the string not being NULL terminated.

Thx Quantum1024. I was also thinking about the same problem, but how do i initialise it? Cos I want to start of with an empty array.

oh thanks!!! Quantum1024, your hint has just woke me up. I've managed to solved the problem by initialising store. Thanks for all yr help guys, and thanks InvariantLoop

1.

Code:

---

fgets(input, MAX, stdin);

length = stringLength(input);

...

int stringLength(char str[])
{
  int i = 0;
  for(i=0; i<MAX; i++)
  {
      if(str[i ]=='\n')
          return i;
  }
  return i;
}

---

fgets will store at most 49 meaningfull characters (reserving the 50th one for the NULL terminating character) meaning that the maximum string length for something stored in input should be 49. Your stringLength function however will currently return 50 as the length for such a string.

It might just be better to use strlen on the input array (not calling stringLength at all) and then check if the last character is a newline or not and change it to a NULL if it is (also adjusting the length by -1):

Code:

---

fgets(input,MAX,stdin);
length = strlen(input);
if(length > 0 && input[length-1] == '\n')
{
    input[length-1] = '\0';
    --length;
}

---

2.

Code:

---

for(i=0;i<=length;i++)
{
    temp[i ] = input[i ];
}

---

Why? Just use strcpy instead, that's what it is there for.

3.

Code:

---

char store[MAX]; //longest string stored here
...
int maxLength = strlen(store);
...
if(length>=maxLength)
{

---

maxLength gets set to some indeterminate size at the beginning of the program. The array store can have random junk in it and strlen(store) may return anything from 0 on up. You probably want to set maxLength to MAX initially.

Cool! hk_mp5kpdw thank you so much. I have gain more knowledge on C programming now =). Silly me, din use the strcpy function