🔒 Locked

I have a runtime error that i cant figure out (SOLVED)

Started by donjonson Mar 25, 2006 at 10:16 AM 13 replies 2.8k views

Original Post

Mar 25, 2006 at 10:16 AM

the runtime error I get is Run-Time Check Failure #2 - Stack around the variable 'chChount' was corrupted. I cant see anything wrong with what I am doing here can you? here is my code


#include <iostream>
#include <string>
#include <fstream>
using namespace std;
int main()
{
	ifstream infile;
	string buffer;
	char chbuf;

	long chCount[256]= {0};
	//memset(chCount, 0, 256 * sizeof(int));

	cout<<"please entere a filename to analyze: ";
	getline(cin, buffer);
	infile.open(buffer.c_str(), ios::in);

	if(infile.is_open())
	{
	while(!infile.eof())
	{

		chbuf = infile.get();
	
		chCount[chbuf]++;
	}

	for(int i =0;i<256;i++)
	{
		if(chCount != 0)
		{
			cout<<char(i)<<": "<<chCount<<endl;
		}
	}

	infile.close();
	}
	return 0;
}

[Edited by - donjonson on March 25, 2006 2:02:39 PM]

jonahrowley

Mar 25, 2006 at 10:47 AM

Does istream::get() return EOF on end of file? If so, the constant for an integer EOF will be an invalid character, either > 265 or < 0. Either way, you're writing outside your array bounds. istream::get() returns an int, not a char, so this is a possibility.

rpg_code_master

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:04 AM

On what line do you get this error exactly?

dave

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:21 AM

Hey bud,

At first guess i would say that it is because you have a char array of length 256 but are only setting the first element, upon initialisation.

Dave

jonahrowley

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:22 AM

Quote:
Original post by Dave
Hey bud,

At first guess i would say that it is because you have a char array of length 256 but are only setting the first element, upon initialisation.

Dave

That wouldn't cause an overflow. It would cause incorrect results though..

simon10k

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:29 AM

while(!infile.eof()){	chbuf = infile.get();		chCount[chbuf]++;}//I think the error is there. Try this...int i=0;while(!infile.eof())		chCount[i++] = infile.get();

edit:

I fixed it for you =)

#include <iostream>#include <string>#include <fstream>using namespace std;int main(){	cout<<"please entere a filename to analyze: ";	string buffer;		getline(cin, buffer);	ifstream infile(buffer.c_str());		if(infile.is_open() == false)		return 1;		char chCount[256];	int i = 0;	while(!infile.eof())						chCount[i++] = infile.get();		chCount = '\0';	i=0;	while(chCount && i < 256)		cout << chCount[i++];		cin.ignore();}

[Edited by - simon10k on March 25, 2006 12:29:49 PM]

Kylotan

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:40 AM

You're reading into a char, which you shouldn't do. You should read into an int. This is because you're not guaranteed to get just a char. In fact, you may receive 'EOF' which is a value that may not fit into a char.

Secondly, the range of char is -128 to 127. You may therefore read in a value that doesn't fit in your array. In fact it would end up fitting before your array.

So what you should do, is read into an int, check it's not EOF, then cast it to an unsigned char before using it as an array index.

Iftah

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:45 AM

try changing "char chbuf" to "unsigned char chbuf"

jonahrowley

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:52 AM

Simon10k: That isn't what he was trying to do. In fact, that code is even more broken as it does NO bounds checking and will almost certainly overflow and probably crash. This is a perfect example of how NOT to read data from a file.

simon10k

Mar 25, 2006 at 11:58 AM

Whatever... This is a messy example to start with. I just noticed tho, that your right! he was trying to count the letters. *feels stupid =)*

donjonson

Mar 25, 2006 at 1:18 PM

Thaks for all your help.

and yes I am trying to count the characters in the file.

and it works perfectly. The error doesn't come until the program reaches literally the end. In debug it breaks after the closing perenthasis of main().
I think you were right when you said that I am trying to put a non char into the chbuf. I changed the section in question to the following and it fixed it.

while(!infile.eof())	{		chbuf = infile.get();			if(unsigned char(chbuf) <256)		chCount[unsigned char(chbuf)]++;	}

and instead of saying "this is a perfect example of how not to do something. why dont you give the right example. This is the for beginners message board after all. why post here if you not a beginner or not someone who would like to help beginners?

donjonson

Mar 25, 2006 at 1:22 PM

Quote:
Original post by Dave
Hey bud,

At first guess i would say that it is because you have a char array of length 256 but are only setting the first element, upon initialisation.

Dave

actually the following does initialize every element in the array to 0 or whatever you put in the perens.
just FYI. :)

long chCount[256]= {0};

jonahrowley

Mar 25, 2006 at 1:23 PM

Quote:
and instead of saying "this is a perfect example of how not to do something. why dont you give the right example.

I was talking about simon10k's code, and I don't think I need to provide an example of how to read data from a file into a buffer.

donjonson

Mar 25, 2006 at 1:28 PM

my mistake sorry :)

Kylotan

Mar 26, 2006 at 6:48 AM

Quote:
Original post by donjonson
Thaks for all your help.

and yes I am trying to count the characters in the file.

and it works perfectly.

By the way, you still have a couple of subtle bugs, that you may never notice but I'll share anyway.

.get can return EOF, as I said earlier. However, by that point you have already read in that value, and you'd try to count it in your array, which is not generally what you want to do.

Also, because you cast the value to an unsigned char, there is no point comparing them against 256, because every unsigned char is less than 256. So your if statement achieves nothing. One better way to write such a loop would be like so:

int chbuf;while((chbuf = infile.get()) != EOF){    ++chCount[unsigned char(chbuf)];}

Note that I also changed it to use pre-increment instead of post-increment. It's a good habit to get into using pre-increment where possible because it can be quicker than post-increment on some objects.

Topic Locked

This topic has been locked by a moderator. New replies are not allowed.