Question

The __________ function copies one string to another.

Short answer

Answer: The purpose of the null terminator is to mark the end of the copied text in the destination string, ensuring that the string is properly formatted and interpreted correctly by the programming language.

Step-by-step solution

Understand the string copying function

The string copying function is a method used to copy the content of one string variable (source) into another string variable (destination). In programming languages, this function is often called `strcpy`. The function takes two string variables as inputs and overwrites the content of the destination string with the content of the source string.

Read the source string

To begin the process of copying, the function first reads the content of the source string. It starts from the first character and sequentially goes through all the characters until it reaches the end of the string, which is typically indicated by a null terminator character.

Copy characters from source to destination

Once the source string has been read, the function will copy each character from the source to the destination, one character at a time. The destination string's characters will be overwritten by the corresponding characters from the source string. This process will continue until all characters from the source string have been copied to the destination string.

Add null terminator

After all the characters from the source string have been copied to the destination string, the function will add a null terminator character at the end of the destination string to mark the end of the copied text. This ensures that the destination string is properly formatted, and it will be interpreted correctly by the programming language.

Return the destination string

Once the copying is finished and the null terminator is in place, the function returns the destination string. This completes the string copying process. The destination string now contains the same content as the source string, and they can be compared, modified, or utilized in any other manner according to the program requirements.