Why is the strcmp function returning 1?

Question

The below code compares s[2] with the string "sw". Since I have assigned s[2] = "sw", shouldn't it return 1 when I use strcmp. But I am getting 0 as the value of i.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>

int main () {
  char s[2] = "sw";
  int i;
 
  i = strcmp(s, "sw");

  printf("%d",i);
}

Because `s` is of length `2` and is not `null`-terminated. Your code has undefined behavior. — Eugene Sh., Nov 09 '21 at 17:08
To expand on the above comment: make it `s[3]` so there's space for the null terminator. — AKX, Nov 09 '21 at 17:08
`char s[2] = "sw";` the array is to short, you forgot the trailing `'\0'`. It must be al least `char s[3]` — Ingo Leonhardt, Nov 09 '21 at 17:09
And `char s[] = "...";` will correctly allocate the 3 chars. — ikegami, Nov 09 '21 at 17:13

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 09 '21 at 17:11

0

C stringss require to be null character terminated. So the char array holding it has to have space for it.

int main () {
  char s[3] = "sw"; 
  int i;
 
  i = strcmp(s, "sw");

  printf("%d",i);
}

https://godbolt.org/z/1Gs8WqG5h

answered Nov 09 '21 at 17:11

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Why is the strcmp function returning 1?

1 Answers1