Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!ucla-cs!cit-vax!tybalt.caltech.edu!palmer
From: palmer@tybalt.caltech.edu (David Palmer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: sprintf() bug?
Message-ID: <5349@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu>
Date: 28 Jan 88 00:51:00 GMT
References: <4VzXREy00WABE7k0FU@andrew.cmu.edu>
Sender: news@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu
Reply-To: palmer@tybalt.caltech.edu.UUCP (David Palmer)
Organization: California Institute of Technology
Lines: 26

In article <4VzXREy00WABE7k0FU@andrew.cmu.edu> rs4u+@andrew.cmu.edu (Richard Siegel) writes:
>Additional recommendation: to avoid having to use CtoPstr, just use the "\p" 
>at the beginning of the string:
>
>	sprintf(tempstring, "%s %f %s %f", "\pthe square of ", x, "is", (x *x));
>	DrawString(tempstring);

This will not work in any C which I understand.  What will be put into
tempstring is a null terminated string something like:
		\016the square of ;&91/z\234dsi 5.00000 is 25.00000
where \016 is the first character in a Pascal string of length 14,
;&91/z\234dsi represents random garbage in the memory following the
string, which only ends when there happens to be a byte containing \0,
and the remainder is self explanatory.

"\pfoo" does not represent a C-string whose first character is '\p', it
represents a Pascal string, a one-byte length followed by that many
characters.  Sprintf is passed an address as its argument, and it
expects that address to be of a C-string.  By the same token, using
a format string of "\p%s %f %s %f" will also fail to work.


		David Palmer
		palmer@tybalt.caltech.edu
		...rutgers!cit-vax!tybalt.caltech.edu!palmer
	"Every day it's the same thing--variety.  I want something different."