Printf() function what is the difference between printf(...) and sprintf(...)

And return a value less than zero if an error occurred. Syntax for printf is:. The only difference between sprintf and printf is that sprintf writes data into a character array, while printf writes data to stdout, the standard output device.

Dinesh Thakur is a Freelance Writer who helps different clients from all over the globe. It is not possible to write all statements in the same program. Therefore, the program is divided into several functions. Functions provide code reusability. In programming language such as C language , main is a function. It indicates the starting point of the execution. There are built-in functions and user-defined functions. The programmer creates user-defined functions. The language provides built-in functions.

The programmer can use them without implementing from the beginning. Two main built-in functions in C language are printf and fprintf. This article discusses the difference between these two functions. The key difference between print and fprintf is that printf is a C function used to print a formatted string to a standard output stream which is the computer screen, while fprintf is a C function to print a formatted string to a file.

Overview and Key Difference 2. What is printf 3. What is fprintf 4. Vishwanath Dalvi Vishwanath Dalvi Experiment with them by writing some sample code. That is very easy way to clearly understand the difference between them. Prefer snprintf to sprintf to avoid silly buffer overflows. Prefer streams or Boost formatters to avoid silly buffer overflows and nasty type-unsafety bugs — John Dibling.

Maxim, whilst you raise a valid point I'll take the safety in knowledge that my buffers aren't going to overflow and explode my app in to pieces. Maxim: Point is, there's no need.

My code isn't a bottleneck. So why prematurely optimize? Show 8 more comments. Active Oldest Votes. Andrew 4, 1 1 gold badge 20 20 silver badges 39 39 bronze badges.

John Bode John Bode k 17 17 gold badges silver badges bronze badges. Wouldn't a producer create output something? Asking because I genuinely do not know.

DaveVoyles: These are from the perspective of your program. An input stream produces bytes for your program to read; an output stream consumes the bytes produced from your program.

But it just means format. Add a comment. Moo-Juice Moo-Juice Rubal Rubal 11 11 silver badges 12 12 bronze badges. Note there is also vsprintf , vfprintf and vprintf. Post Self 1, 2 2 gold badges 11 11 silver badges 31 31 bronze badges.

The v flavors are non-standard i believe — John Dibling.