problem with using strtok()

Just check the lenght of the token that is returned - if it is 0, you have to consecutive delimiters and need to handle that properly.

No, strtok skips leading delimiters, so if you have a bunch of delimiters in a row, they are all skipped - there is no such thing as a zero-length token.

From  Linux Programmer's Manual:

"The strsep() function was introduced as a replacement for strtok(), since the latter cannot handle empty fields. However, strtok() conforms to ANSI-C and hence is more portable."

You will need to implement your own strtok function or use strsep if your platform supports it.  Really cheap version of custom strtok is given below.  

char *MyStrTok(char *text, const char del)
{
    static char *curTok = NULL;
    char *result = NULL;
    if ( text != NULL )
    {
        curTok = text;
    }
    result = curTok;
    if ( curTok != NULL )
    {
        curTok = ::strchr(curTok, del);
        if ( curTok != NULL ) *curTok++ = 0;
    }

    return result;
}

Or that:



#include <iostream>
#include <string>
#include <vector>

using namespace std;

int stringToArray(const string& str, char delim, vector<string>& strArr)
{
    size_t next;
    size_t last = 0;
    while ((next = str.find(delim, last)) != string::npos)
    {
        strArr.push_back(str.substr(last, next - last));
        last = next + 1;
    }
    strArr.push_back(str.substr(last));
    return strArr.size();
}


int main(int argc, char* argv[])
{
     string str = ",abc,def,,ghi,jki,";
     vector<string> strArr;
     int nTok = stringToArray(str, ',', strArr);
     cout << str << " # of tokens " << nTok << endl;
     
     for (int i = 0; i < nTok; i++)
         cout << strArr[i] << endl;

     getline(cin, str);

     return 1;
}

Regards, Alex

Thank you very much to all
I have Microsoft VC++.Net standard version. It doesnt support strsep(). So I use custom version strtok() that is MyStrTok() given by drichards. But I am having compiling error. I tried many times, just cannot solve the problem. Can someone take a look at it ? Thank you
Here is my code.

#include <iostream>
#include <fstream>
#include <iomanip>
#include <string>

using namespace std;

const int MaxSize=1024;

//////////////////////////////////
//
// struct for reference data
//
//////////////////////////////////
typedef struct
{
 char keyData[10];
 char valueData[20];
}KeyRef;


//////////////////////////////////////////
// function to lookup value by key
//////////////////////////////////////////
char* findKeyValue(KeyRef* ref, char* k){
      
      for (int i=0;i<MaxSize;i++){
            if (!strcmp(ref[i].keyData,k))
                  return ref[i].valueData;
      }
      return "None";
};


///////////////////////////////
//
// Custom version of strtok()
//
///////////////////////////////

char* MyStrTok(char* text, const char del)
{
    static char *curTok = NULL;
    char *result = NULL;
    if ( text != NULL )
    {
        curTok = text;
    }
    result = curTok;
    if ( curTok != NULL )
    {
        curTok = ::strchr(curTok, del);
        if ( curTok != NULL ) *curTok++ = 0;
    }

    return result;
};

///////////////////////////////
//
// main
//
///////////////////////////////
main(int arc, char *arv[])
{

ifstream fin("fin.txt");
ofstream fout("fout.txt");
char row_read[512];
char row_elem[10][50];

ifstream fin2("frefer.txt");
ofstream fout2("refer_out.txt");
KeyRef refer_data[MaxSize];
char refer_read[MaxSize];
char refer_row_elem[2][MaxSize];
int i=0,j=0,k=0;

//////////////////////////////////////////
// read refer file into struct of array
//////////////////////////////////////////
while( fin2.getline( refer_read,MaxSize ))
{
      char *tok = strtok(refer_read,",");
      while( tok != NULL) {
            strcpy(refer_row_elem[j],tok);
            tok= strtok(NULL,",");
            j++;
      }
      strcpy(refer_data[k].keyData, refer_row_elem[0]);
      strcpy(refer_data[k].valueData, refer_row_elem[1]);
      j=0;
      k++;
}

/////////////////////////////////////////////////
// output refer file , review data only
/////////////////////////////////////////////////
//for (int q=0;q<k;q++){
//       fout2 << setw(10) << refer_data[q].keyData << setw(10) << refer_data[q].valueData << endl;
//}


///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// for each line of file  
// assume there are 5 collums in each row in file fin.txt
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
while( fin.getline( row_read, sizeof( row_read ) ) )
{
      //////////////////////////////////////////
      // parse string with ","
      //////////////////////////////////////////
      char *token = MyStrTok( row_read, "," );
      //char *token = strsep( row_read, "," );
      while( token != NULL )
      {
        /* While there are tokens in "string" */
        strcpy(row_elem[i], token );
        /* Get next token: */
        token = strtok( NULL, "," );
        i++;
      }

      //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
      // get reference value by looking at key in reference file
      //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
      char* valueFound;
      valueFound = findKeyValue(refer_data, row_elem[0]);
      cout << " value found - " << valueFound << endl;

      //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
      // output to file, first colmn replaced with value from reference file
      //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
      fout<<setw(10)      << valueFound
          <<setw(10)  << row_elem[4]
          <<setw(10)      << row_elem[3]
          <<setw(10)      << row_elem[2]
          <<setw(10)      << row_elem[1]
          <<endl;

      i=0;
}

return 0;
}

1) Make sure you turn off precompiled headers for this file or add '#include "stdafx.h"' at the top of the file.

2) '     char *token = MyStrTok( row_read, "," );' should be:  char *token = MyStrTok( row_read, ',' );
Note the single quotes - my version of strtok takes a single character as a delimiter.  The code is a lot simpler if you don't need multiple delimiters.

If you need to turn off precompiled headers, right click on the source file in the Solution Explorer and select "Properties". Go to the C/C++->Precompiled Headers page and choose "Not Using Precompiled Headers" on the "Create/Use Precompiled Header" line.

drichards,
single quotes works, but other problems.
1. #include "stdafx.h" cannot be found in my vc7\include folder.
2. precompiled headers have been turn off.
3. without '#include "stdafx.h"', I can compile my code, but the output is funny. It only catch one column.
I post my fin, and frefer files. you run the code and will see the output.

fin:
id,notes1,notes2,notes3,account name,amount
111,aaa,a3,a4,,100000
222,bbb,b3,b4,,200000
333,ccc,c3,c4,cccc5,300000
444,ddd,d3,d4,dddd5,400000
555,eee,e3,e4,eeee5,500000
666,fff,f3,f4,ffff5,600000
777,ggg,g3,g4,gggg5,700000
888,hhh,h3,h4,hhhh5,800000
999,iii,i3,i4,iiii5,900000


frefer:
111,111aaa
222,222bbb
333,333ccc
444,444ddd
555,555eee
666,666fff
777,777ggg
888,888hhh
999,999iii


Thanks and waiting online

Here is an implementation of strsep() function:
http://www.greatsnakes.com/Sepal/d4/d0/strsep_8c-source.html