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From: defaria@hpclapd.HP.COM (Andy DeFaria)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Initializing arrays of char
Message-ID: <660085@hpclapd.HP.COM>
Date: 5 Oct 90 16:49:29 GMT
References: <1990Oct4.152756.6850@micrognosis.co.uk>
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Calif. Language Lab
Lines: 26

>/ hpclapd:comp.lang.c / poser@csli.Stanford.EDU (Bill Poser) /  6:16 pm  Oct  4, 1990 /
>Regarding the assignment of "12345" to char x[5] and struct{char x[5]},
>I spoke too soon. K&R2 contains a detail I hadn't noticed, and am not
>sure that I approve of. On p.219, in the discussion of initialization
>of fixed size arrays by string constants, it states:
>
>	...the number of characters in the string, NOT COUNTING
>	THE TERMINATING NULL CHARACTER, must not exceed the
>	size of the array. [emphasis mine]
>
>This means that the assignment of "12345" to an array of five characters,
>is legal. If K&R2 here reflects the standard, then both initializations
>are legitimate.
>
>This seems to me to be a bad idea. Everywhere else, one has to take
>into account the terminating null. For example, x[5] = 'a' is
>an error. Not counting the terminating null here is inconsistent.
>Can anyone explain this decision?
>----------

It seems to me (and I am be no stretch of the imagination a  C expert) that
K&R C is saying "Sure you can use all 5 characters for a legitimate string.
You can manipulate them any way you want.  You might be using it to contain
a fixed length string of 5 characters.  But don't you  ever  try  to use it
with any string procedures (strlen, or even printf's %s operator) or expect
to get burned!"