From:	"John M. Aldrich" <fighteer AT cs DOT com>
Newsgroups:	comp.os.msdos.djgpp
Subject:	Re: Begginer problems with C & DJGPP
Date:	Sat, 27 Dec 1997 16:57:28 -0500
Organization:	Two pounds of chaos and a pinch of salt.
Lines:	40
Message-ID:	<34A579C8.6B72@cs.com>
References:	<682ti1$keq$1 AT svr-c-02 DOT core DOT theplanet DOT net>
Reply-To:	fighteer AT cs DOT com
NNTP-Posting-Host:	ppp213.cs.com
Mime-Version:	1.0
To:	djgpp AT delorie DOT com
DJ-Gateway:	from newsgroup comp.os.msdos.djgpp

Mark Whalebelly wrote:
> 
> HI everyone,
> 
>       I've been working my way through the C for dummies books ,
> The problem I sometimes  get is when I copy a program  from
> the book and run the program any characters displayed on the
> screen don't appear untill the program has ended.
> 
> dropnuke.c    in "C for Dummies volume 2" is the best example.
> 
> Hope someone can help.

Standard output is line-buffered by default in DJGPP.  For more
information, look at chapter 9.4 of the DJGPP Frequently Asked Questions
list (v2/faq210b.zip from SimTel or online at
http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/v2faq/).

The short solution:  to get a program to display buffered output, do one
of the following:

1) Print a newline.
2) Call a stdio input function (scanf(), getchar(), gets()).
3) Call fflush( stdout ).
4) Turn off buffering with setbuf( stdout, NULL ).

_C for Dummies_ is not the greatest of tutorials; I read the first book
as a lark and was not impressed.  While it may provide a relatively
painless introduction to C, it glosses over a great many rules in the
process.  One of my biggest pet peeves about _C for Dummies_ is that it
advocates the use of 'void main()' without telling readers that it's a
bad idea.

-- 
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|      John M. Aldrich       | "History does not record anywhere at |
|       aka Fighteer I       | any time a religion that has any     |
|   mailto:fighteer AT cs DOT com   | rational basis."                     |
| http://www.cs.com/fighteer |                - Lazarus Long        |
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