c - how to return a string array from a function

Question

char * myFunction () {

    char sub_str[10][20]; 
    return sub_str;

} 

void main () {

    char *str;
    str = myFunction();

}

error:return from incompatible pointer type

thanks

Answer 1

A string array in C can be used either with char** or with char*[]. However, you cannot return values stored on the stack, as in your function. If you want to return the string array, you have to reserve it dynamically:

char** myFunction() {
    char ** sub_str = malloc(10 * sizeof(char*));
    for (int i =0 ; i < 10; ++i)
        sub_str[i] = malloc(20 * sizeof(char));
    /* Fill the sub_str strings */
    return sub_str;
}

Then, main can get the string array like this:

char** str = myFunction();
printf("%s", str[0]); /* Prints the first string. */

EDIT: Since we allocated sub_str, we now return a memory address that can be accessed in the main