gets(3) Library Functions Manual gets(3)
NAME
gets - get a string from standard input (DEPRECATED)
LIBRARY
Standard C library (libc, -lc)
SYNOPSIS
#include <stdio.h>
[[deprecated]] char *gets(char *s);
DESCRIPTION
Never use this function.
gets() reads a line from stdin into the buffer pointed to by s until
either a terminating newline or EOF, which it replaces with a null byte
('\0'). No check for buffer overrun is performed (see BUGS below).
RETURN VALUE
gets() returns s on success, and NULL on error or when end of file oc-
curs while no characters have been read. However, given the lack of
buffer overrun checking, there can be no guarantees that the function
will even return.
ATTRIBUTES
For an explanation of the terms used in this section, see attrib-
utes(7).
┌───────────────────────────────────────────┬───────────────┬─────────┐
│ Interface │ Attribute │ Value │
├───────────────────────────────────────────┼───────────────┼─────────┤
│ gets() │ Thread safety │ MT-Safe │
└───────────────────────────────────────────┴───────────────┴─────────┘
STANDARDS
POSIX.1-2008.
HISTORY
C89, POSIX.1-2001.
LSB deprecates gets(). POSIX.1-2008 marks gets() obsolescent. ISO C11
removes the specification of gets() from the C language, and since
glibc 2.16, glibc header files don't expose the function declaration if
the _ISOC11_SOURCE feature test macro is defined.
BUGS
Never use gets(). Because it is impossible to tell without knowing the
data in advance how many characters gets() will read, and because
gets() will continue to store characters past the end of the buffer, it
is extremely dangerous to use. It has been used to break computer se-
curity. Use fgets() instead.
For more information, see CWE-242 (aka "Use of Inherently Dangerous
Function") at http://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/242.html
SEE ALSO
read(2), write(2), ferror(3), fgetc(3), fgets(3), fgetwc(3), fgetws(3),
fopen(3), fread(3), fseek(3), getline(3), getwchar(3), puts(3),
scanf(3), ungetwc(3), unlocked_stdio(3), feature_test_macros(7)
Linux man-pages 6.7 2023-10-31 gets(3)
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