Confusion with `fread` Behavior in C: Inconsistent Data Sizes When Reading Binary Files
I'm relatively new to this, so bear with me. I've been struggling with this for a few days now and could really use some help. I recently switched to I'm working with a perplexing scenario while using `fread` to read binary data from a file. My intent is to read a specific structure from a binary file, but I keep getting inconsistent sizes for the data being read. For context, I'm working with a structure defined as follows: ```c typedef struct { int id; double value; char name[20]; } Record; ``` When I use the following code to read records from a binary file: ```c FILE *file = fopen("data.bin", "rb"); if (file == NULL) { perror("Failed to open file"); return 1; } Record record; size_t result; while ((result = fread(&record, sizeof(Record), 1, file)) == 1) { printf("Read Record: ID=%d, Value=%f, Name=%s\n", record.id, record.value, record.name); } if (ferror(file)) { perror("behavior reading file"); } fclose(file); ``` I expect to read each record in its entirety, but sometimes I find that the fields are not filled correctly, particularly the `name` field, which appears to contain garbage values. I’ve verified that the file is indeed written correctly using `fwrite`, and I ensure that the file is not being modified by another process while I read it. I've also checked the structure size with `sizeof(Record)` and confirmed it returns the expected value (28 bytes). However, when I inspect the file using a hex editor, it appears to match what I expect as well. To troubleshoot, I even added behavior handling after the `fread` call to check `ferror`, which only tells me that the read operation was successful. Is there something I'm missing regarding how `fread` handles the reading of binary data, or could there be an scenario with how the data is structured or aligned? Any insights would be appreciated, especially if there are common pitfalls with binary file I/O that I might be overlooking. This issue appeared after updating to C 3.9. Am I approaching this the right way? I'm using C stable in this project. Is there a better approach?