Structures in C have their own issues when it comes to structure-pointers and structures within pointers. I wrote about this issue a few months back.
Another structure issue occurs with arrays within structures and arrays of structures. It also involves interesting notation — especially when you add pointers to the mix.
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A few weeks back, I wrote a post on the fflush() function, which immediately relieves an output buffer, releasing its contents. The mirror opposite of this function might be another output control function, setbuf().
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The challenge for this month’s Exercise is to fill a grid with random letters, a to z, then rotate that grid on its side, counterclockwise, and display the results. Such fun.
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It took me a while to figure out the significance of the nextafter() function. Though I understand what it does now, I still can’t figure out how it’s useful, though I assume it has a valid purpose otherwise it wouldn’t be in the standard library.
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I’m not immersed in higher mathematics, therefore most of my programming puzzles tend to involve strings or other items I can easily comprehend. Beyond manipulating characters and strings, for my programming kung fu training I keep returning to the matrix or grid.
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It’s been a while since I’ve been seriously concerned about wasting system resources. Back when I programmed a TRS-80 Model III with only 48K of RAM, keeping an eye on memory usage was vital. Today, not so much. In fact, if you desire to write code that consumes a lot of memory, CPU time, or other system resources, more power to you!
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Last year, I wrote about using the standard error device stderr to generate output that can’t be redirected. This technique is often used to send error messages to the console, though I noted how these messages may show up out of sync with standard output. This situation can be resolved, providing you know how to flush the stderr device buffer.
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Stop using the atoi() function! Yes, it’s a golden oldie, often my go-to function for converting strings to integers, but it’s weak. The strtol() function, on the other hand, not only converts strings to integers, it can validate input as well.
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This month’s Exercise is to emulate the antique atoi() function, which converts a string of digits into an integer value.
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Imagine my disappointment to learn that the atoi() function, one of the first I learned in C, is actually a macro. I’m horrified. As much as I treasure converting strings to integers, I shall survive this life-changing discovery.
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