Question on printf()

[Conor P. Cahill]

In article <1990Jun15.042610.18292 at dasys1.uucp> jpr at dasys1.UUCP (Jean-Pierre Radley) writes:
>In article <1990Jun8.030206.4532 at virtech.uucp> cpcahil at virtech.UUCP (Conor P. Cahill) writes:
>> [as one of the ways to geta printf() call to show up right away]
>
>>3. add a setbuf(stdout,(char *) 0) at the begining of your program.  This 
>>turns off all output buffering and can have a detrimental effect on the
>>overall performance of your software.  
>
>Why is that?

Because it causes all output be be written immediatly.  If you are using
something like curses for a full screen program it noticably slows down 
the screen drawing. (Enough that an end-user will notice and complain about
it).

Normally output is not written to stdout (that is associated with a tty) until
a newline is sent.  When stdout is redirected to a file, it is buffered for 
a full stdio block.  Using setbuf() turns off all buffering.



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Conor P. Cahill            (703)430-9247        Virtual Technologies, Inc.,
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