strsep(3) - NetBSD Manual Pages

STRSEP(3)               NetBSD Library Functions Manual              STRSEP(3)


NAME

     strsep -- separate strings


LIBRARY

     Standard C Library (libc, -lc)


SYNOPSIS

     #include <string.h>

     char *
     strsep(char **stringp, const char *delim);


DESCRIPTION

     The strsep() function locates, in the null-terminated string referenced
     by *stringp, the first occurrence of any character in the string delim
     (or the terminating `\0' character) and replaces it with a `\0'.  The
     location of the next character after the delimiter character (or NULL, if
     the end of the string was reached) is stored in *stringp.  The original
     value of *stringp is returned.

     An ``empty'' field, i.e., one caused by two adjacent delimiter charac-
     ters, can be detected by comparing the location referenced by the pointer
     returned by strsep() to `\0'.

     If *stringp is initially NULL, strsep() returns NULL.


EXAMPLES

     The following uses strsep() to parse a string, containing tokens delim-
     ited by white space, into an argument vector:

           char **ap, *argv[10], *inputstring;

           for (ap = argv; ap < &argv[9] &&
               (*ap = strsep(&inputstring, " \t")) != NULL;) {
                   if (**ap != '\0')
                           ap++;
           }


HISTORY

     The strsep() function is intended as a replacement for the strtok() func-
     tion.  While the strtok() function should be preferred for portability
     reasons (it conforms to ANSI X3.159-1989 (``ANSI C89'')) it is unable to
     handle empty fields, i.e., detect fields delimited by two adjacent delim-
     iter characters, or to be used for more than a single string at a time.
     The strsep() function first appeared in 4.4BSD.

NetBSD 3.0                      August 11, 2002                     NetBSD 3.0