how to read an empty string in c++?

Question

consider this code snippet in c++ -

string str;
cin>>str;

If I simply press enter at this stage, the pointer moves to next line but keep waiting for the input even if I intentionally want to input an empty string.

My objective is to read a word. And If I press enter, it should be taken as a empty string.

Don't use cin because it doesn't read a string - it reads a word. Use getline to read a string. — Jerry Jeremiah
– Jerry Jeremiah, Commented Nov 13, 2015 at 4:49
@JerryJeremiah this behaviour can be changed with std::noskipws as stated in mnciitbhu's answer . — Wolf
– Wolf, Commented Dec 13, 2017 at 14:01

Felix Glas · Accepted Answer · 2015-11-13 04:49:51Z

7

Use std::getline:

std::string str;
std::getline(std::cin, str);

answered Nov 13, 2015 at 4:49

Felix Glas

15.5k8 gold badges59 silver badges84 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

3 Comments

Vishal Sharma Over a year ago

I have included bits/stdc++.h

Vishal Sharma Over a year ago

Its working. The actual problem was that I was reading an integer before reading the string. using cin.ignore solved the problem.

The Paramagnetic Croissant Over a year ago

@VishalSharma The actual problem is the mere use of operator>>. Don't mix calls to operator>> and getline(). Actually, just stop using operator>> already – it's quirky, it's clumsy, it's hard to use correctly. If you want to read an integer, just use getline() and parse the input string using std::stoi().

0x6773 · Accepted Answer · 2015-11-13 07:05:59Z

2

There are two ways :

Use std::getline()

std::string str;
getline(cin, str);

Or using std::noskipws

std::string str;
cin >> noskipws >> str;

Don't forget to use cin.ignore().

answered Nov 13, 2015 at 7:05

0x6773

1,1161 gold badge15 silver badges33 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

how to read an empty string in c++?

2 Answers 2

3 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

3 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Linked

Related