Go to the first, previous, next, last section, table of contents.


Other Input Conversions

This section describes the miscellaneous input conversions.

The `%p' conversion is used to read a pointer value. It recognizes the same syntax used by the `%p' output conversion for printf (see section Other Output Conversions); that is, a hexadecimal number just as the `%x' conversion accepts. The corresponding argument should be of type void **; that is, the address of a place to store a pointer.

The resulting pointer value is not guaranteed to be valid if it was not originally written during the same program execution that reads it in.

The `%n' conversion produces the number of characters read so far by this call. The corresponding argument should be of type int *. This conversion works in the same way as the `%n' conversion for printf; see section Other Output Conversions, for an example.

The `%n' conversion is the only mechanism for determining the success of literal matches or conversions with suppressed assignments. If the `%n' follows the locus of a matching failure, then no value is stored for it since scanf returns before processing the `%n'. If you store -1 in that argument slot before calling scanf, the presence of -1 after scanf indicates an error occurred before the `%n' was reached.

Finally, the `%%' conversion matches a literal `%' character in the input stream, without using an argument. This conversion does not permit any flags, field width, or type modifier to be specified.


Go to the first, previous, next, last section, table of contents.