What I meant is more like: #define BUFSIZE 100 char buf[BUFSIZE+1] buf[BUFSIZE]=0 // for global var, it is already zeroed, right? Then one can cal

What I meant is more like: #define BUFSIZE 100 char buf[BUFSIZE+1] buf[BUFSIZE]=0 // for global var, it is already zeroed, right? Then one can call strncpy(buf, BUFSIZE, ...) without worrying about null-termination.