default value for struct member in C

c struct
user1508893 picture user1508893 · Dec 5, 2012 · Viewed 193.2k times · Source

Is it possible to set default values for some struct member? I tried the following but, it'd cause syntax error:

typedef struct
{
  int flag = 3;
} MyStruct;

Errors:

$ gcc -o testIt test.c 
test.c:7: error: expected ‘:’, ‘,’, ‘;’, ‘}’ or ‘__attribute__’ before ‘=’ token
test.c: In function ‘main’:
test.c:17: error: ‘struct <anonymous>’ has no member named ‘flag’

Answer

Alok Save picture Alok Save · Dec 5, 2012

Structure is a data type. You don't give values to a data type. You give values to instances/objects of data types.
So no this is not possible in C.

Instead you can write a function which does the initialization for structure instance.

Alternatively, You could do:

struct MyStruct_s 
{
    int id;
} MyStruct_default = {3};

typedef struct MyStruct_s MyStruct;

And then always initialize your new instances as:

MyStruct mInstance = MyStruct_default;

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