[sclug] Off topic C question

[Alex Butcher]

On Fri, 22 Sep 2006, Patrick wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> Can anyone see why this character counting program always finds zero 
> characters?  Its based on an example from K&R Chapter 1 which also fails.

Using gcc -ansi -pedantic helps debug this sort of thing. Oh, and I do hope
you're using the ANSI edition of K&R! :-)

Taking the problems it finds step-by-step...

>
> #include "stdio.h"
>
> int main()
> {
>        /* count characters*/
>        FILE *inFile;
>        inFile = fopen("motd.xml", "r");

^ move this line below the next two declarations

>        int c = 0;
>        long lc = 0;
>
>        while ((c = getc(inFile)) != EOF)
>        {
>                if (c == "l") {

You're comparing an integer (c) with a pointer to a char here. As Dickon
pointed out, you want single quotes here, so the character is a constant. I
suspect that's also supposed to be '\n' (newline) rather than anything else.

>                ++lc;
>                }
>
>
>        }
>
>        printf("Typed %1d lines\n", nc);

lc, rather than nc, as Simon pointed out.

>        system("pause");
>
>        return 0;
>
> }

Best Regards,
Alex.
-- 
Alex Butcher, Bristol UK.                           PGP/GnuPG ID:0x5010dbff

"[T]he whole point about the reason why I think it is important we go for
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  - Tony Blair, 6 June 2006 <http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page9566.asp>