Entering an Integer then a string with spaces c++

Question

How can i cin an integer then a string "with spaces" this is my code

int x;string s;
    cout<<"Enter Integer"<<endl;
    cin>>x;
    cout<<"Enter the string with spaces"<<endl;
    //if i used cin>>s here then it will not read all the text because it has spaces 
    // is i used getline(cin,s); then it will not read any thing

What did you try? Also *WHY* does everyone keep including ``?? — DeiDei, Jan 24 '17 at 23:46
@DeiDei: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/25311011/how-does-include-bits-stdc-h-work-in-c (apparently it was recommended by a blog once). — Greg Hewgill, Jan 24 '17 at 23:51
@GregHewgill Oh, so it's basically when you're too lazy to include the individual appropriate standard headers. Make sense. — DeiDei, Jan 24 '17 at 23:53
@AhmedElectrony The problem itself is easily solvable if you google "how to enter string c++". The fact that there is an int before it matters not. — DeiDei, Jan 24 '17 at 23:54
no it matters and the string is with spaces so that the only way i found to read it was to getline and this didn`t work when there is an integer before — Ahmed Nouralla, Jan 24 '17 at 23:56

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 24 '17 at 23:57

The problem you are likely having is that the cin >> x reads only the digits of the number you type, and not the following newline. Then, when you do a cin >> s to read a string, the input processor sees the newline and returns only an empty string.

The solution is to use a function that is designed to read whole lines of input, such as std::getline. Do not use the extraction operator >> for interactive input.

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

To read a string with spaces use std::getline.

But!

Pay attention to what happens with >> when it hits a delimiter. It stops and leaves the delimiter int he stream. This is not a problem so long as you only use >> as >> will discard all of the whitespace. std::getline will capture that whitespace, and a common usecase is

user types in number and hits enter
user types in string and hits enter

So what happens? >> extracts the number and stops when it hits whitespace. This leaves the end of line put in the stream by pressing enter in the stream. std::getline comes along and the first thing it sees is... end of line. std::getline stores an empty string and immediately returns. Now the program processes an empty string and the user, still expecting to type in a string enters a string that will be read by some future read, possibly putting the input stream into an error case and certainly giving the user a surprise.

A common solution is to use ignore(numeric_limits<streamsize>::max(), '\n'); to consume any data still in the stream up to and including the end of line before prompting the user for input and calling std::getline.

Entering an Integer then a string with spaces c++

2 Answers2

But!