Q: If fflush won't work, what can I use to flush input?
A: It depends on what you're trying to do. If you're trying to get rid of an unread newline or other unexpected input after calling scanf (see questions 12.18a-12.19), you really need to rewrite or replace the call to scanf (see question 12.20). Alternatively, you can consume the rest of a partially-read line with a simple code fragment like
while((c = getchar()) != '\n' && c != EOF) /* discard */ ;
(You may also be able to use the curses flushinp function.)
There is no standard way to discard unread characters from a stdio input stream. Some vendors do implement fflush so that fflush(stdin) discards unread characters, although portable programs cannot depend on this. (Some versions of the stdio library implement fpurge or fabort calls which do the same thing, but these aren't standard, either.) Note, too, that flushing stdio input buffers is not necessarily sufficient: unread characters can also accumulate in other, OS-level input buffers. If you're trying to actively discard input (perhaps in anticipation of issuing an unexpected prompt to confirm a destructive action, for which an accidentally-typed ``y'' could be disastrous), you'll have to use a system-specific technique to detect the presence of typed-ahead input; see questions 19.1 and 19.2. Keep in mind that users can become frustrated if you discard input that happened to be typed too quickly.
References:
ISO Sec. 7.9.5.2
H&S Sec. 15.2
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