In addition to Will Dean's version, the following are common for whole buffer initialization:

Copychar s[10] = {'\0'};

or

Copychar s[10];
memset(s, '\0', sizeof(s));

or

Copychar s[10];
strncpy(s, "", sizeof(s));
Answer from Matt Joiner on Stack Overflow
Discussions

C string initialization - undersized | The FreeBSD Forums
I am trying the following problem on FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE with gcc 4.2.1. I try to initialize a string, that's correct format according to C guides is: char abcd[5] = "abcd"; In general if I initialize a string that is undersized I get a compiler warning: char abcd[3] = "abcd"; warning... More on forums.freebsd.org
🌐 forums.freebsd.org
May 17, 2012
No need to initialize string (i.e. string Guess = "";) - Talk - GameDev.tv
(I code in C++ professionally, but am watching the videos with my kids) String variables are already initialized to an empty string, so the suggested initialization in lecture 17 is a no-op. In some ways I guess it’s good practice (as a type like ‘int’ will no be so initialized and if ... More on community.gamedev.tv
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0
April 29, 2017
Empty string initialization
Empty string initialization Easy: std::string text2; More on reddit.com
🌐 r/cpp_questions
29
12
January 29, 2024
[Caesar]How to declare an empty string array in C?
First, you should realize that the caesar and vigenere problems don't require you to create an encrypted string for later printing. You can print the result of encrypting each character as you go. Your declaration of c_txt is trying to create an array of i strings. What you could do is compute the length (call it p_len, for example) of the p_txt string, and then define an array whose element type is char and whose dimension is p_len + 1. The extra element is to allow for a null character ('\0') after the encrypted string. That null terminating character is needed if you intend to print the string using printf. More on reddit.com
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2
3
April 26, 2014
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Quora
quora.com › How-do-you-initialize-char*-to-an-empty-string-in-C
How to initialize char* to an empty string in C - Quora
Answer (1 of 8): An empty string in C - meaning one that would be a legal-formed string that would be regarded as a string of zero-length by the string.h string functions and other functions that operate on strings - is simply [code ]""[/code]. It is an array of [code ]char [/code]with a element,...
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GeeksforGeeks
geeksforgeeks.org › c language › strings-in-c
Strings in C - GeeksforGeeks
November 14, 2025 - char str[] = "Geeks"; This line declares a character array str and initializes it with the string "Geeks". Internally, this creates an array like: { 'G', 'e', 'e', 'k', 's', '\0'} The null character '\0' is automatically added at the end to ...
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Unstop
unstop.com › home › blog › strings in c | initialization and string functions (+examples)
Strings In C | Initialization and String Functions (+Examples)
May 30, 2025 - In the programming language C, ... string by creating a new variable that is a character array with no specified length, then giving it no value except for two quotes side-by-side, symbolizing blank space....
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DEV Community
dev.to › biraj21 › empty-strings-and-zero-length-arrays-how-do-we-store-nothing-1jko
Empty Strings and Zero-length Arrays: How do We Store... Nothing? - DEV Community
June 25, 2024 - When an IntArray is initialized, memory is allocated based on the capacity in bytes, and the address of the allocated memory is stored in the data pointer. The length field is then set to zero. This process is analogous to what higher-level languages like JavaScript do internally when you create an empty array. Knowing that an empty string in C is just a pointer that points to '\0' character feels good.
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Northern Illinois University
faculty.cs.niu.edu › ~winans › CS501 › Notes › cstrings.html
C Strings
Array elements after the null character are not part of the string, and their contents are irrelevant. A "null string" or "empty string" is a string with a null character as its first character: The length of a null string is 0. ... This declaration creates an unnamed character array just large ...
Find elsewhere
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C For Dummies
c-for-dummies.com › blog
Null Versus Empty Strings | C For Dummies Blog
August 12, 2017 - By the way, this function wouldn’t ... must be initialized before you assault them with a function. Though C doesn’t really have official typing for empty and null strings, you can still tell the difference between them: compare. That’s the secret, should the need ever arise. You must be logged in to post a ...
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FreeBSD
forums.freebsd.org › development › userland programming and scripting
C string initialization - undersized | The FreeBSD Forums
May 17, 2012 - Size: 6 Why 6? Why not 5? Because the array not has a null character at the end, the function of strlen(3) misses and goes into the not initialized memory. С has not strings, you can use a pointer to a memory.
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University of Chicago
classes.cs.uchicago.edu › archive › 2020 › winter › 15200-1 › lecs › notes › Lec10Strings.html
Strings
char str1[] = "Hello world"; // allocate 12, initialize to "Hello world" char str2[50] = "Hello world"; // allocate 50, initialize to "Hello world" char str3[] = {'H','e','l','l','o',' ','w','o','r','l','d', '\0'}; // allocate 12, initialize to "Hello world" char str4[12] = {'H','e','l','l','o',' ','w','o','r','l','d', '\0'}; // allocate 12, initialize to "Hello world" char str5[20] = "" // allocate 20, but initialize to empty string · Strings are much like arrays, except for two constraints: ... The length is determined by the location of '\0' This changes what the loop looks like to step through the string. Let's find the length of the string (the number of characters before '\0'): unsigned int stringlength(char s[]) { int length = 0; for (length = 0; s[length] != '\0'; length++) ; // all of the work is being done in the for loop syntax!
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GameDev.tv
community.gamedev.tv › unreal courses › talk
No need to initialize string (i.e. string Guess = "";) - Talk - GameDev.tv
April 29, 2017 - (I code in C++ professionally, but am watching the videos with my kids) String variables are already initialized to an empty string, so the suggested initialization in lecture 17 is a no-op. In some ways I guess it’s good practice (as a type like ‘int’ will no be so initialized and if the read operation on cin fails, an int variable will continue to be uninitialized).
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Sololearn
sololearn.com › en › Discuss › 88185 › why-puting-empty-string-to-a-variable
Why puting empty string to a variable? | Sololearn: Learn to code for FREE!
Traceback (most recent call last): File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module> NameError: name 'name' is not defined ... @Zoom Because your code initializes the variable before first use. Mine doesn't. Empty string is because your next operation might be: name + "another string" If it were numeric ...
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W3Schools
w3schools.com › c › c_files.php
C Files - File Handling and How To Create Files
To create a file, you can use the w mode inside the fopen() function.
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Log2Base2
log2base2.com › C › string › declaration-and-initialization-of-string-in-c.html
Declaration and initialization of string in c
There are multiple ways we can initialize a string. If we assign string directly with in double quotes, no need to bother about null character.
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Python Examples
pythonexamples.org › c › how-to-create-an-empty-string
How to Create an Empty String in C
#include <stdio.h> int main() { char emptyString[] = "\0"; printf("Empty string created: '%s'", emptyString); return 0; }
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Cppreference
en.cppreference.com › w › cpp › string › basic_string.html
std::basic_string - cppreference.com
Although it is required that customized construct or destroy is used when constructing or destroying elements of std::basic_string until C++23, all implementations only used the default mechanism. The requirement is corrected by P1072R10 to match existing practice. ... #include <iostream> #include <string> int main() { using namespace std::literals; // Creating a string from const char* std::string str1 = "hello"; // Creating a string using string literal auto str2 = "world"s; // Concatenating strings std::string str3 = str1 + " " + str2; // Print out the result std::cout << str3 << '\n'; std:
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Google
google.github.io › styleguide › cppguide.html
Google C++ Style Guide
Implicit conversions can be a simpler ... for std::string and const char*. List initialization syntax is a concise and expressive way of initializing objects. Implicit conversions can hide type-mismatch bugs, where the destination type does not match the user's expectation, or the user is unaware that any conversion will take place. Implicit conversions can make code harder to read, particularly in the presence ...
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MathWorks
mathworks.com › matlab › language fundamentals › data types › characters and strings
Create String Arrays - MATLAB & Simulink
Convert a datetime value to a string. ... Also, you can read text from files into string arrays using the readtable, textscan, and fscanf functions. String arrays can contain both empty and missing values. An empty string contains zero characters. When you display an empty string, the result is a pair of double quotes with nothing between them ("").
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TutorialsPoint
tutorialspoint.com › how-to-initialize-a-string-to-an-empty-string-in-chash
How to initialize a string to an empty string in C#?
June 22, 2020 - using System; namespace Demo { class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { string myStr = null; if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(myStr)) { Console.WriteLine("String is empty or null!"); } Console.ReadKey(); } } } String is empty or null! Another way to initialize a string to an empty string, ...