cvisual-studiotextfopenfclose

C language: reading a .txt file



I'm trying to write a program that reads a text file, using C with Visual Studio.
This is my current code (which doesn't work):

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>

int main() {
    FILE *filePTR;
    char fileRow[100];

    filePTR = fopen_s(&filePTR, "text.txt", "r");

    // Opens the file
    if(filePTR){
        while(!feof(filePTR)) {
            // Reads file row
            fgets(fileRow, 100, filePTR);
            // Displays file row
            printf("%s \n", fileRow);
        }
        printf("\nEnd of file.");
    }
    else {
        printf("ERROR! Impossible to read the file.");
    }

    // Closes the file
    fclose(filePTR);

    return 0;
}

I'm getting the following warning:

'filePTR' may be '0': this condition does not meet the function specification 'fclose'.

What am I doing wrong? I haven't been programming in C since a while ...


Solution

  • The problems begin long before the fclose. This line is incorrect:

    filePTR = fopen_s(&filePTR, "text.txt", "r");
    

    It overwites the file pointer already assigned by passing a pointer as the function argument &filePTR.

    The function returns an error status, not the file pointer. Please see the man page:

    Return Value Zero if successful; an error code on failure.

    Also, please see Why is while ( !feof (file) ) always wrong?

    I suggest this:

    #include <stdio.h>
    #include <stdlib.h>
    
    int main(void) {                        // correct definition
        FILE *filePTR;
        char fileRow[100];
    
        if(fopen_s(&filePTR, "text.txt", "r") == 0) {
            while(fgets(fileRow, sizeof fileRow, filePTR) != NULL) {
                printf("%s", fileRow);      // the string already contains a newline
            }
            fclose(filePTR);                // only close if it was opened
            printf("\nEnd of file.");
        }
        else {
            printf("ERROR! Impossible to read the file.");
        }
    
        return 0;
    }
    

    Note that I moved the fclose call up. You can't close a file that you did not open.