C++ cstring strchr() Function

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The C++ strchr() function is used to find the first occurrence of a character in a string.

This function is similar to the strstr() function but the difference is that strstr() function finds the first occurrence of a substring in a string whereas strchr() function finds the first occurrence of a character in a string.

Let's understand the strchr() function with an example. Assume that you have a string s and you need to find the first occurrence of the character 't' in the string. In this case, you can use the strchr() function.

Syntax

Following is the syntax of the C++ strchr() function −

char *strchr(const char *str, int c);

Parameters

Parameters of the strchr() function are as follows −

• str: This is the pointer to the string where the search is performed.
• c: This is the character to be located. It is passed as its int promotion.

Return Value

The strchr() function returns a pointer to the first occurrence of the character c in the string, or NULL if the character does not occur in the string.

Example 1

In the following example will help you to understand the usage of the C++ strchr() function. Here, we will take a string str and then search for the first occurrence of the character 'o' in the string using the strchr() function.

#include <iostream>
#include <cstring>
using namespace std;

int main() {
   char str[] = "tutorialspoint";
   char *ret;

   ret = strchr(str, 'o');

   if(ret) {
      cout << "Character found: " << *ret << endl;
   } else {
      cout << "Character not found" << endl;
   }

   return 0;
}

Output

Following is the output of the above C++ program:

Character found: o

Example 2

Now, let's take another example where we will search for the character that is not present in the string.

For this, we will take a string str and then search for the first occurrence of the character 'z' in the string using the strchr() function.

#include <iostream>
#include <cstring>
using namespace std;

int main() {
   char str[] = "tutorialspoint";
   char *ret;

   ret = strchr(str, 'z');

   if(ret) {
      cout << "Character found: " << *ret << endl;
   }else {
      cout << "Character not found" << endl;
   }

   return 0;
}

Output

Following is the output of the above C++ program:

Character not found

Example 3

Let's take another example where we will search for the character that is present in the string but not in the first 5 characters of the string.

For this, we will take a string str and then search for the first occurrence of the character 'p' in the first 5 characters of the string using the strchr() function.

#include <iostream>
#include <cstring>
using namespace std;

int main() {
   char str[] = "tutorialspoint";
   char *ret;

   ret = strchr(str, 'p');

   if(ret) {
      cout << "Character found: " << *ret << endl;
   } else {
      cout << "Character not found" << endl;
   }

   return 0;
}

Output

Following is the output of the above C++ program:

Character found: p