Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!ucsd!chem.ucsd.edu!tps
From: tps@chem.ucsd.edu (Tom Stockfisch)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: EOF considered harmful
Message-ID: <584@chem.ucsd.EDU>
Date: 24 Oct 89 00:50:07 GMT
References: <266@m1.cs.man.ac.uk>
Reply-To: tps@chem.ucsd.edu (Tom Stockfisch)
Organization: Chemistry Dept, UC San Diego
Lines: 20

In article <266@m1.cs.man.ac.uk> ian@r6.UUCP (Ian Cottam) writes:
>	char ch;
>	while ( ! feof(stdin) ) {
>		ch= getchar();
>		putchar(ch);
>	}
>1) This program runs as quickly as the ``((ch= getchar()) != EOF)''
>   version (on my SUN3 with gcc).

The problem with this version is that feof() does
not test for an error condition on stdin, whereas
getc() will return EOF on i/o error.  So your
program might loop infinitely if there is
an i/o error.

The above code fragment will also fill up the disk
with (char)EOF if chars are unsigned.
-- 

|| Tom Stockfisch, UCSD Chemistry	tps@chem.ucsd.edu