STRSEP(3) BSD Programmer's Manual STRSEP(3)NAMEstrsep - separate strings
SYNOPSIS
#include <string.h>
char *
strsep(char **stringp, const char *delim);
DESCRIPTION
The strsep() function locates, in the 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 characters,
can be detected by comparing the location referenced by the pointer re-
turned by strsep() to '\0'.
If *stringp is initially NULL, strsep() returns NULL.
EXAMPLES
The following uses strsep() to parse a string, containing tokens delimit-
ed by whitespace, into an argument vector:
char **ap, *argv[10], *inputstring;
for (ap = argv; ap < &argv[9] &&
(*ap = strsep(&inputstring, " \t")) != NULL;) {
if (**ap != '\0')
ap++;
}
*ap = NULL;
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 C")) it is unable to han-
dle empty fields, i.e., detect fields delimited by two adjacent delimiter
characters, or to be used for more than a single string at a time. The
strsep() function first appeared in 4.4BSD.
MirOS BSD #10-current June 9, 1993 1
