Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!mcvax!cernvax!ethz!forty2!poole
From: poole@forty2.UUCP (Simon Poole)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: What should [fs]scanf return?
Message-ID: <588@forty2.UUCP>
Date: 16 Jan 89 13:23:37 GMT
Reply-To: poole@forty2.UUCP (Simon Poole)
Organization: Exp. Physics University Zuerich
Lines: 36

Somehow I've got the feeling that this has been hashed thru before, but
I probably wasn't paying attention then. Consider the following code
fragment:

........
    printf("%d\n",sscanf("123","%d",&dummy));
    printf("%d\n",sscanf("123","%*d",&dummy));   
    printf("%d\n",sscanf("123:456","%d:%d",&dummy,&dummy));
    printf("%d\n",sscanf("123:456","%*d:%*d",&dummy,&dummy));
........

What should it print?

Minix-ST 1.1*    BSD 4.2    I think it should be   

    1             1                1
    1             -1               0
    3             2                2
    3             -1               0


K&R first edition says (about scanf):

'It returns as its value the number of sucessfully matched and assigned
 input items'

The fixes to get the behaviour in the third row are quite simple, but is it
correct?

* Applies to the PC version too as far as I know.

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UUCP:   ...mcvax!cernvax!forty2!poole			Simon Poole
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