xref: /freebsd/lib/libc/string/strsep.3 (revision 06c3fb27)
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31.Dd May 28, 2018
32.Dt STRSEP 3
33.Os
34.Sh NAME
35.Nm strsep
36.Nd separate strings
37.Sh LIBRARY
38.Lb libc
39.Sh SYNOPSIS
40.In string.h
41.Ft char *
42.Fn strsep "char **stringp" "const char *delim"
43.Sh DESCRIPTION
44The
45.Fn strsep
46function locates, in the string referenced by
47.Fa *stringp ,
48the first occurrence of any character in the string
49.Fa delim
50(or the terminating
51.Ql \e0
52character) and replaces it with a
53.Ql \e0 .
54The location of the next character after the delimiter character
55(or NULL, if the end of the string was reached) is stored in
56.Fa *stringp .
57The original value of
58.Fa *stringp
59is returned.
60.Pp
61An
62.Dq empty
63field (i.e., a character in the string
64.Fa delim
65occurs as the first character of
66.Fa *stringp )
67can be detected by comparing the location referenced by the returned pointer
68to
69.Ql \e0 .
70.Pp
71If
72.Fa *stringp
73is initially
74.Dv NULL ,
75.Fn strsep
76returns
77.Dv NULL .
78.Sh EXAMPLES
79The following uses
80.Fn strsep
81to parse a string, and prints each token in separate line:
82.Bd -literal -offset indent
83char *token, *string, *tofree;
84
85tofree = string = strdup("abc,def,ghi");
86if (string == NULL)
87	err(1, "strdup");
88while ((token = strsep(&string, ",")) != NULL)
89	printf("%s\en", token);
90
91free(tofree);
92.Ed
93.Pp
94The following uses
95.Fn strsep
96to parse a string, containing tokens delimited by white space, into an
97argument vector:
98.Bd -literal -offset indent
99char **ap, *argv[10], *inputstring;
100
101for (ap = argv; (*ap = strsep(&inputstring, " \et")) != NULL;)
102	if (**ap != '\e0')
103		if (++ap >= &argv[10])
104			break;
105.Ed
106.Sh SEE ALSO
107.Xr memchr 3 ,
108.Xr strchr 3 ,
109.Xr strcspn 3 ,
110.Xr strpbrk 3 ,
111.Xr strrchr 3 ,
112.Xr strspn 3 ,
113.Xr strstr 3 ,
114.Xr strtok 3
115.Sh HISTORY
116The
117.Fn strsep
118function
119is intended as a replacement for the
120.Fn strtok
121function.
122While the
123.Fn strtok
124function should be preferred for portability reasons (it conforms to
125.St -isoC )
126it is unable to handle empty fields, i.e., detect fields delimited by
127two adjacent delimiter characters, or to be used for more than a single
128string at a time.
129The
130.Fn strsep
131function first appeared in
132.Bx 4.4 .
133