fgetc, fgetwc

Read a character from a stream.

Syntax

int fgetc(
   FILE *stream
);
wint_t fgetwc(
   FILE *stream
);

Parameters

stream
Pointer to FILE structure.

Return value

fgetc returns the character read as an int or returns EOF to indicate an error or end of file. fgetwc returns, as a wint_t, the wide character that corresponds to the character read or returns WEOF to indicate an error or end of file. For both functions, use feof or ferror to distinguish between an error and an end-of-file condition. If a read error occurs, the error indicator for the stream is set. If stream is NULL, fgetc and fgetwc invoke the invalid parameter handler, as described in Parameter validation. If execution is allowed to continue, these functions set errno to EINVAL and return EOF.

Remarks

Each of these functions reads a single character from the current position of the file associated with stream. The function then increments the associated file pointer (if defined) to point to the next character. If the stream is at end of file, the end-of-file indicator for the stream is set.

fgetc is equivalent to getc, but is implemented only as a function, rather than as a function and a macro.

fgetwc is the wide-character version of fgetc; it reads c as a multibyte character or a wide character when stream is opened in text mode or binary mode, respectively.

The versions with the _nolock suffix are identical except that they aren't protected from interference by other threads.

For more information about processing wide characters and multibyte characters in text and binary modes, see Unicode stream I/O in text and binary modes.

By default, this function's global state is scoped to the application. To change this behavior, see Global state in the CRT.

Generic-text routine mappings

TCHAR.H routine	_UNICODE and _MBCS not defined	_MBCS defined	_UNICODE defined
_fgettc	fgetc	fgetc	fgetwc

Requirements

Function	Required header
fgetc	<stdio.h>
fgetwc	<stdio.h> or <wchar.h>

For more compatibility information, see Compatibility.

Example

// crt_fgetc.c
// This program uses getc to read the first
// 80 input characters (or until the end of input)
// and place them into a string named buffer.

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

int main( void )
{
   FILE *stream;
   char buffer[81];
   int  i, ch;

   // Open file to read line from:
   fopen_s( &stream, "crt_fgetc.txt", "r" );
   if( stream == NULL )
      exit( 0 );

   // Read in first 80 characters and place them in "buffer":
   ch = fgetc( stream );
   for( i=0; (i < 80 ) && ( feof( stream ) == 0 ); i++ )
   {
      buffer[i] = (char)ch;
      ch = fgetc( stream );
   }

   // Add null to end string
   buffer[i] = '\0';
   printf( "%s\n", buffer );
   fclose( stream );
}

Input: crt_fgetc.txt

Line one.
Line two.

Output

Line one.
Line two.

See also

Stream I/O
fputc, fputwc
getc, getwc