How to use getline() in C++ when there are blank lines in input?

In C++, if we need to read few sentences from a stream, the generally preferred way is to use getline() function. It can read till it encounters newline or sees a delimiter provided by user.

Here is a sample program in c++ that reads four sentences and displays them with ” : newline” at the end

// A simple C++ program to show working of getline
#include <iostream>
#include <cstring>
using namespace std;
int main()
{
    string str;
    int t = 4;
    while (t--)
    {
        // Read a line from standard input in str
        getline(cin, str);
        cout << str << " : newline" << endl;
    }
    return 0;
}

Sample Input :

 This
 is
 Geeks
 for

As expected output is:

This : newline
is  : newline
Geeks : newline
for : newline

The above input and output look good, there may be problems when input has blank lines in between.

Sample Input :

This

is 

Geeks

for

Output:

This : newline
 : newline
is  : newline
 : newline

It doesn’t print the last 2 lines. The reason is that getline() reads till enter is encountered even if no characters are read. So even if there is nothing in the third line, getline() considers it as a single line. Further observe the problem in the second line.

The code can be modified to exclude such blank lines.

Modified code:

// A simple C++ program that uses getline to read
// input with blank lines
#include <iostream>
#include <cstring>
using namespace std;
int main()
{
    string str;
    int t = 4;
    while (t--)
    {
        getline(cin, str);

        // Keep reading a new line while there is
        // a blank line
        while (str.length()==0 )
            getline(cin, str);

        cout << str << " : newline" << endl;
    }
    return 0;
}

Input:

This

is 

Geeks

for

Output:

This : newline
is  : newline
Geeks : newline
for : newline

This article is contributed by Sarin Nanda. If you like GeeksforGeeks and would like to contribute, you can also write an article and mail your article to contribute@geeksforgeeks.org. See your article appearing on the GeeksforGeeks main page and help other Geeks.