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    <h1 id="firstHeading" class="firstHeading">strcmp</h1>            <table class="t-dcl-begin"> <tr class="t-dsc-header"> <th> Defined in header <code>&lt;string.h&gt;</code> </th> <th> </th> <th> </th> </tr> <tr class="t-dcl"> <td class="t-dcl-nopad"> <pre data-language="c">int strcmp( const char *lhs, const char *rhs );</pre>
</td> <td class="t-dcl-nopad"> </td> <td class="t-dcl-nopad"> </td> </tr>  </table> <p>Compares two null-terminated byte strings lexicographically.</p>
<p>The sign of the result is the sign of the difference between the values of the first pair of characters (both interpreted as <code>unsigned char</code>) that differ in the strings being compared.</p>
<p>The behavior is undefined if <code>lhs</code> or <code>rhs</code> are not pointers to null-terminated byte strings.</p>
<h3 id="Parameters"> Parameters</h3> <table class="t-par-begin"> <tr class="t-par"> <td> lhs, rhs </td> <td> - </td> <td> pointers to the null-terminated byte strings to compare </td>
</tr>
</table> <h3 id="Return_value"> Return value</h3> <p>Negative value if <code>lhs</code> appears before <code>rhs</code> in lexicographical order.</p>
<p>Zero if <code>lhs</code> and <code>rhs</code> compare equal.</p>
<p>Positive value if <code>lhs</code> appears after <code>rhs</code> in lexicographical order.</p>
<h3 id="Notes"> Notes</h3> <p>This function is not locale-sensitive, unlike <code><a href="strcoll" title="c/string/byte/strcoll">strcoll</a></code> and <code><a href="strxfrm" title="c/string/byte/strxfrm">strxfrm</a></code>.</p>
<h3 id="Example"> Example</h3> <div class="t-example"> <div class="c source-c"><pre data-language="c">#include &lt;string.h&gt;
#include &lt;stdio.h&gt;
 
void demo(const char* lhs, const char* rhs)
{
    int rc = strcmp(lhs, rhs);
    const char *rel = rc &lt; 0 ? "precedes" : rc &gt; 0 ? "follows" : "equals";
    printf("[%s] %s [%s]\n", lhs, rel, rhs);
}
 
int main(void)
{
    const char* string = "Hello World!";
    demo(string, "Hello!");
    demo(string, "Hello");
    demo(string, "Hello there");
    demo("Hello, everybody!" + 12, "Hello, somebody!" + 11);
}</pre></div> <p>Output:</p>
<div class="text source-text"><pre data-language="c">[Hello World!] precedes [Hello!]
[Hello World!] follows [Hello]
[Hello World!] precedes [Hello there]
[body!] equals [body!]</pre></div> </div> <h3 id="References"> References</h3>  <ul>
<li> C11 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:2011): </li>
<ul><li> 7.24.4.2 The strcmp function (p: 365-366) </li></ul>
<li> C99 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1999): </li>
<ul><li> 7.21.4.2 The strcmp function (p: 328-329) </li></ul>
<li> C89/C90 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1990): </li>
<ul><li> 4.11.4.2 The strcmp function </li></ul>
</ul>         <h3 id="See_also"> See also</h3> <table class="t-dsc-begin"> <tr class="t-dsc"> <td> <div><a href="strncmp" title="c/string/byte/strncmp"> <span class="t-lines"><span>strncmp</span></span></a></div> </td> <td> compares a certain amount of characters of two strings <br> <span class="t-mark">(function)</span>  </td>
</tr> <tr class="t-dsc"> <td> <div><a href="../wide/wcscmp" title="c/string/wide/wcscmp"> <span class="t-lines"><span>wcscmp</span></span></a></div>
<div><span class="t-lines"><span><span class="t-mark-rev t-since-c95">(C95)</span></span></span></div> </td> <td> compares two wide strings <br> <span class="t-mark">(function)</span>  </td>
</tr> <tr class="t-dsc"> <td> <div><a href="memcmp" title="c/string/byte/memcmp"> <span class="t-lines"><span>memcmp</span></span></a></div> </td> <td> compares two buffers <br> <span class="t-mark">(function)</span>  </td>
</tr> <tr class="t-dsc"> <td> <div><a href="strcoll" title="c/string/byte/strcoll"> <span class="t-lines"><span>strcoll</span></span></a></div> </td> <td> compares two strings in accordance to the current locale <br> <span class="t-mark">(function)</span>  </td>
</tr> <tr class="t-dsc"> <td colspan="2"> <span><a href="https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/string/byte/strcmp" title="cpp/string/byte/strcmp">C++ documentation</a></span> for <code>strcmp</code> </td>
</tr> </table>            <div class="_attribution">
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