CString Functions
String Functions
C also has many useful string functions, which can be used to perform certain operations on strings.
To use them, you must include the<string.h> header file in your program:
String Length
For example, to get the length of a string, you can use thestrlen() function:
Example
printf("%zu", strlen(alphabet));
In theStrings chapter, we usedsizeof to get the size of a string/array. Note thatsizeof andstrlen behaves differently, assizeof also includes the\0 character when counting:
Example
printf("%zu\n", strlen(alphabet)); // 26
printf("%zu\n", sizeof(alphabet)); // 27
It is also important that you know thatsizeof will always return the memory size (in bytes), and not the actual string length:
Example
printf("%zu\n", strlen(alphabet)); // 26
printf("%zu\n", sizeof(alphabet)); // 50
Concatenate Strings
To concatenate (combine) two strings, you can use thestrcat() function:
Example
char str2[] = "World!";
// Concatenate str2 to str1 (result is stored in str1)
strcat(str1, str2);
// Print str1
printf("%s", str1);
Note that the size ofstr1 should be large enough to store the result of the two strings combined (20 in our example).
Copy Strings
To copy the value of one string to another, you can use thestrcpy() function:
Example
char str2[20];
// Copy str1 to str2
strcpy(str2, str1);
// Print str2
printf("%s", str2);
Note that the size ofstr2 should be large enough to store the copied string (20 in our example).
Compare Strings
To compare two strings, you can use thestrcmp() function.
It returns0 if the two strings are equal, otherwise a value that is not 0:
Example
char str2[] = "Hello";
char str3[] = "Hi";
// Compare str1 and str2, and print the result
printf("%d\n", strcmp(str1, str2)); // Returns 0 (the strings are equal)
// Compare str1 and str3, and print the result
printf("%d\n", strcmp(str1, str3)); // Returns -4 (the strings are not equal)
Complete String Reference
For a complete reference of string functions, go to ourC <string.h> Library Reference.
