help with Char pointers (for formatted dates)

[tbonifie]

Hello -

I'm re-learning some programming to use at work (haven't done C in 11 years and am learning C++)...

I'm returning a pointer from a function and when it's returned, the target char array has some extra garbage characters at the end.

So here's the function I've written (with much stripped away):

pMydate points to a 'char MyOtherArray[17]' outside of the function...

char* asciDate(char* pMydate)
{
   char  myarray[17];
   char* pMyarray;
 
   // some code here that puts the characters in the string...
 
   pMyarray = myarray;
   strncpy(pMydate, pMyarray, 17);
   return pMydate;
}

When I get back to the code that calls this function, MyOtherArray holds exactly what I expect. pMydate, however, which is pointing to MyOtherArray, shows the 17 characters I expect, then 2 additional garbage characters.

If I try to output pMydate to stdio or a file, it includes the garbage. (i.e. cout << pMydate;)

Why are 2 garbage characters showing up where the pointer is pointing?

Platform = WinXP
Using Microsoft Visual C++ (Visual Studio 8)

[oler1s]

How is a regular character array different from a C string? Remember that a C string requires that it be terminated with a NUL ('\0') character. If you have 17 letters, to form a C string, you need the 18th NUL character.

[tbonifie]

Thanks, figured it was a stupid newbie question!!!

Works like a charm.

Regards,

Travis