xref: /freebsd/lib/libc/stdio/fgetln.3 (revision 63f537551380d2dab29fa402ad1269feae17e594)
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28.\"     @(#)fgetln.3	8.3 (Berkeley) 4/19/94
29.\"
30.Dd June 11, 2020
31.Dt FGETLN 3
32.Os
33.Sh NAME
34.Nm fgetln
35.Nd get a line from a stream
36.Sh LIBRARY
37.Lb libc
38.Sh SYNOPSIS
39.In stdio.h
40.Ft char *
41.Fn fgetln "FILE *stream" "size_t *len"
42.Sh DESCRIPTION
43The
44.Fn fgetln
45function
46returns a pointer to the next line from the stream referenced by
47.Fa stream .
48This line is
49.Em not
50a C string as it does not end with a terminating
51.Dv NUL
52character.
53The length of the line, including the final newline,
54is stored in the memory location to which
55.Fa len
56points.
57(Note, however, that if the line is the last
58in a file that does not end in a newline,
59the returned text will not contain a newline.)
60.Sh RETURN VALUES
61Upon successful completion a pointer is returned;
62this pointer becomes invalid after the next
63.Tn I/O
64operation on
65.Fa stream
66(whether successful or not)
67or as soon as the stream is closed.
68Otherwise,
69.Dv NULL
70is returned.
71The
72.Fn fgetln
73function
74does not distinguish between end-of-file and error; the routines
75.Xr feof 3
76and
77.Xr ferror 3
78must be used
79to determine which occurred.
80If an error occurs, the global variable
81.Va errno
82is set to indicate the error.
83The end-of-file condition is remembered, even on a terminal, and all
84subsequent attempts to read will return
85.Dv NULL
86until the condition is
87cleared with
88.Xr clearerr 3 .
89.Pp
90The text to which the returned pointer points may be modified,
91provided that no changes are made beyond the returned size.
92These changes are lost as soon as the pointer becomes invalid.
93.Sh ERRORS
94.Bl -tag -width Er
95.It Bq Er EBADF
96The argument
97.Fa stream
98is not a stream open for reading.
99.It Bq Er ENOMEM
100The internal line buffer could not be expanded due to lack of available memory,
101or because it would need to expand beyond INT_MAX in size.
102.El
103.Pp
104The
105.Fn fgetln
106function
107may also fail and set
108.Va errno
109for any of the errors specified for the routines
110.Xr fflush 3 ,
111.Xr malloc 3 ,
112.Xr read 2 ,
113.Xr stat 2 ,
114or
115.Xr realloc 3 .
116.Sh SEE ALSO
117.Xr ferror 3 ,
118.Xr fgets 3 ,
119.Xr fgetwln 3 ,
120.Xr fopen 3 ,
121.Xr getline 3 ,
122.Xr putc 3
123.Sh HISTORY
124The
125.Fn fgetln
126function first appeared in
127.Bx 4.4 .
128.Sh CAVEATS
129Since the returned buffer is not a C string (it is not NUL terminated), a
130common practice is to replace the newline character with
131.Sq \e0 .
132However, if the last line in a file does not contain a newline,
133the returned text won't contain a newline either.
134The following code demonstrates how to deal with this problem by allocating a
135temporary buffer:
136.Bd -literal
137	char *buf, *lbuf;
138	size_t len;
139
140	lbuf = NULL;
141	while ((buf = fgetln(fp, &len)) != NULL) {
142		if (buf[len - 1] == '\en')
143			buf[len - 1] = '\e0';
144		else {
145			/* EOF without EOL, copy and add the NUL */
146			if ((lbuf = malloc(len + 1)) == NULL)
147				err(1, NULL);
148			memcpy(lbuf, buf, len);
149			lbuf[len] = '\e0';
150			buf = lbuf;
151		}
152		printf("%s\en", buf);
153	}
154	free(lbuf);
155	if (ferror(fp))
156		err(1, "fgetln");
157.Ed
158