Problem with fscanf not reading inputs correctly

Question

I'm having problems using a fscanf function. It never reads it correctly and always results in blanks.

fscanf(f, " %[^;];%[^;];%d;%d;%d;%d;%[^;];%d;%[^\n]",
            arr[i].loc1, arr[i].loc2, &arr[i].price, &arr[i].rooms, 
            &arr[i].bathroom, &arr[i].carpark, arr[i].type, &arr[i].area, arr[i].furnish);

The code above always outputs " 0 0 0 0 0". But when I try using a scanf and manually input one of the lines, it works perfectly.

The file it's reading from is a .csv file. Here is the contents:

Mont-Kiara;Kuala-Lumpur;1000000;2;2;0;Built-up;1000;Partly

Cheras;Kuala-Lumpur;310000;3;2;0;Built-up;1000;Partly

Kepong;Kuala-Lumpur;358000;3;3;0;Built-up;1000;Partly

Taman-Desa;Kuala-Lumpur;455000;2;2;0;Built-up;1000;Partly

Kepong;Kuala-Lumpur;358000;3;3;0;Built-up;1000;Partly

Kepong;Kuala-Lumpur;358000;3;3;0;Built-up;1000;Partly

And here is the full code:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>

struct houseData {
    
    char loc1[101];
    char loc2[101];
    int price[101];
    int rooms[101];
    int bathroom[101];
    int carpark[101];
    char type[101];
    int area[101];
    char furnish[101];
    
} arr[1001];

int read() {

    int i = 0;
    struct houseData arr[800];
    char temp1[100];
    
    FILE *f = fopen("file.csv", "r");

    while(!feof(f)){
        
        fscanf(f, " %[^;];%[^;];%d;%d;%d;%d;%[^;];%d;%[^\n]"
        , &arr[i].loc1, &arr[i].loc2, &arr[i].price, &arr[i].rooms, 
        &arr[i].bathroom, &arr[i].carpark, &arr[i].type, &arr[i].area, &arr[i].furnish);
        i++;
    }

    fclose(f);
}

int main() {

    read();

    printf("%s %s %d %d %d %d %s %d %s", arr[i].loc1, arr[i].loc2, *arr[i].price, *arr[i].rooms, *arr[i].bathroom, *arr[i].carpark, arr[i].type, *arr[i].area, arr[i].furnish);

    return 0;   
}

Answer 1

There are a lot of issues in your code. Here's a version that may help. The error messages in this version are far from ideal (this does not distinguish between an input format error and a error reading data, for example, nor does it provide much detail on the location of the error), and there is still the possibility of undefined behavior on certain inputs, (see Is `scanf("%d", ...)` as bad as `gets`?) but this should point you in the right direction. Well, at least it may help to improve your use of scanf, but a very reasonable argument can the be made that the "right direction" is to stop using scanf completely. It is very difficult to get things right with scanf, and attempting to do so winds up being much more complex that just using fgets. But for simple use cases it is ... still pointless to use scanf. See http://sekrit.de/webdocs/c/beginners-guide-away-from-scanf.html and many other resources that explain why scanf is a terrible choice.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>

struct houseData{
        char loc1[101];
        char loc2[101];
        int price;
        int rooms;
        int bathroom;
        int carpark;
        char type[101];
        int area;
        char furnish[101];
};

int
read(FILE * f, struct houseData *h)
{
        return 9 == fscanf(f, " %100[^;]; %100[^;]; %d; %d; %d; %d; "
                "%100[^;]; %d; %100[^\n]", h->loc1, h->loc2, &h->price,
                 &h->rooms, &h->bathroom, &h->carpark, h->type, &h->area,
                 h->furnish);
}

int
main(int argc, char **argv)
{
        int rv;
        FILE *f = argc > 1 ? fopen(argv[1], "r") : stdin;
        if( f == NULL ){
                perror(argv[1]);
                return EXIT_FAILURE;
        }
        struct houseData h;
        int i = 0;
        while( read(f, &h) ){
                printf("%d: %s %s %d %d %d %d %s %d %s\n", ++i,
                         h.loc1, h.loc2, h.price, h.rooms, h.bathroom,
                         h.carpark, h.type, h.area, h.furnish);
        }
        if( ! feof(f) ){
                fprintf(stderr, "Error near line %d\n", i);
        }
        fclose(f);
}