CODEWITHSUNDEEP
cinitializationdeclarationc-stringsstring-literals
user13731031
user13731031

Reputation:

Are strings null terminated automatically by the compiler in C?

char *a = "string one";
char b[] = "string two";
char c[] = {'s','t','3'};

Are any of the above string examples null terminated with \0 automatically? I'm sure the last example isn't.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 411

Answers (1)

Vlad from Moscow
Vlad from Moscow

Reputation: 310930

String literals are character arrays containing sequences of characters ended with the terminating zero character '\0'. For example this string literal "string one" has the type char[11] and can be imagined like

char string_literal[] = { 's', 't', 'r', 'i', 'n', 'g', ' ', 'o', 'n', 'e', '\0' };

In this declaration

char *a = "string one";

the pointer a is initialized by the address of the first character of the string literal "string one".

In this declaration the array b is initialized by the elements of the string literal "string two" including its terminating zero character and has the type char[11].

char b[] = "string two";

This declaration is equivalent to

char b[] = { 's', 't', 'r', 'i', 'n', 'g', ' ', 't', 'w', 'o', '\0' };

In this declaration

char c[] = {'s','t','3'};

that is equivalent to 

char c[3] = "st3"; // non valid in C++ but valid in C

the array c having the type char[3] does not contain a string because neither its element is the terminating zero character.

Upvotes: 2

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