1.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1991, 1993 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" This code is derived from software contributed to Berkeley by 5.\" Chris Torek and the American National Standards Committee X3, 6.\" on Information Processing Systems. 7.\" 8.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 9.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 10.\" are met: 11.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 12.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 13.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 14.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 15.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 16.\" 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software 17.\" must display the following acknowledgement: 18.\" This product includes software developed by the University of 19.\" California, Berkeley and its contributors. 20.\" 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 21.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 22.\" without specific prior written permission. 23.\" 24.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 25.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 26.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 27.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 28.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 29.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 30.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 31.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 32.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 33.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 34.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 35.\" 36.\" @(#)strcpy.3 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/4/93 37.\" $FreeBSD: src/lib/libc/string/strcpy.3,v 1.4.2.5 2001/12/14 18:33:59 ru Exp $ 38.\" $DragonFly: src/lib/libc/string/strcpy.3,v 1.2 2003/06/17 04:26:46 dillon Exp $ 39.\" 40.Dd August 9, 2001 41.Dt STRCPY 3 42.Os 43.Sh NAME 44.Nm strcpy , strncpy 45.Nd copy strings 46.Sh LIBRARY 47.Lb libc 48.Sh SYNOPSIS 49.In string.h 50.Ft char * 51.Fn strcpy "char *dst" "const char *src" 52.Ft char * 53.Fn strncpy "char *dst" "const char *src" "size_t len" 54.Sh DESCRIPTION 55The 56.Fn strcpy 57function 58copies the string 59.Fa src 60to 61.Fa dst 62(including the terminating 63.Ql \e0 64character). 65.Pp 66The 67.Fn strncpy 68function copies not more than 69.Fa len 70characters from 71.Fa src 72into 73.Fa dst , 74appending 75.Ql \e0 76characters if 77.Fa src 78is less than 79.Fa len 80characters long, and 81.Em not 82terminating 83.Fa dst 84otherwise. 85.Sh RETURN VALUES 86The 87.Fn strcpy 88and 89.Fn strncpy 90functions 91return 92.Fa dst . 93.Sh EXAMPLES 94The following sets 95.Va chararray 96to 97.Dq Li abc\e0\e0\e0 : 98.Bd -literal -offset indent 99char chararray[6]; 100 101(void)strncpy(chararray, "abc", sizeof(chararray)); 102.Ed 103.Pp 104The following sets 105.Va chararray 106to 107.Dq Li abcdef : 108.Bd -literal -offset indent 109char chararray[6]; 110 111(void)strncpy(chararray, "abcdefgh", sizeof(chararray)); 112.Ed 113.Pp 114Note that it does 115.Em not 116.Tn NUL 117terminate 118.Va chararray 119because the length of the source string is greater than or equal 120to the length parameter. 121.Pp 122The following copies as many characters from 123.Va input 124to 125.Va buf 126as will fit and 127.Tn NUL 128terminates the result. 129Because 130.Fn strncpy 131does 132.Em not 133guarantee to 134.Tn NUL 135terminate the string itself, this must be done explicitly. 136.Bd -literal -offset indent 137char buf[1024]; 138 139(void)strncpy(buf, input, sizeof(buf) - 1); 140buf[sizeof(buf) - 1] = '\e0'; 141.Ed 142.Pp 143This could be better achieved using 144.Xr strlcpy 3 , 145as shown in the following example: 146.Pp 147.Dl "(void)strlcpy(buf, input, sizeof(buf));" 148.Pp 149Note that because 150.Xr strlcpy 3 151is not defined in any standards, it should 152only be used when portability is not a concern. 153.Sh SEE ALSO 154.Xr bcopy 3 , 155.Xr memccpy 3 , 156.Xr memcpy 3 , 157.Xr memmove 3 , 158.Xr strlcpy 3 159.Sh STANDARDS 160The 161.Fn strcpy 162and 163.Fn strncpy 164functions 165conform to 166.St -isoC . 167