Losing a variable value after exiting a loop in C

Question

I'm working on an assignment that is supposed to read employee information from a text file and calculate things such as gross pay and amount due in tax. But I cant do the calculation bit w because one of my variables "hours" changes after I exit the loop that reads from the file.

I'm not sure why I can print the correct values inside, but not outside the loop.

I'm reading Lastname, Firstname, Payrate and Hours worked from the file below:

Whittle Ed 11.50 25.50
Davidson Carl 8.75 38.00
Doe John 17.00 46.50
Marion Louise 13.00 40.00
Prentiss Paula 15.75 50.50

Here's my progress so far:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#define MAXEMPLOYEES 5
#define TAXRATE .15


/************************************************************

    Program Decomposition
    1.0
        1.1 InputData(in lastName, firstName as string, in hours, payrate, as real)
        1.2 CalculatePay()
            1.2.1 CalculateOvertime(in hours, out regularHours, out otHours)
            1.2.2 CalculateGross()
            1.2.3 CalculateTax()
            1.2.4 CalculateNet()
*************************************************************/


/************************************************************

    Function Prototypes
************************************************************/

void InputData(FILE * reportFile, char * lastName, char * firstName, float *hours, float *payrate);
void CalculateOvertime(float hours, float * regularHours, float * otHours);




/************************************************************
 Record of employee information
 ***********************************************************/
typedef struct empRecord{

    char fullName[20];
    char lastName[8+1];
    char firstName[8+1];
    float tax, net;
    float payrate, hours, regularHours, otHours, gross;
}empRecord;

int main(void){

    FILE * reportFile;
    empRecord emp[MAXEMPLOYEES];

    int employeeCount = 0;

    reportFile = fopen("report.txt","r");
        if (reportFile == NULL)
            {
            printf("File failed to open!...\n");
            printf("Press a key to exit...\n");
            while (getchar() != '\n');
            exit (86);
            }
/*********************************************************
    Input Loop
*********************************************************/  
    for(int i = 0; i < MAXEMPLOYEES; i++){

        InputData(reportFile, emp[i].lastName, emp[i].firstName, &emp[i].hours, &emp[i].payrate);
        // Checking for correct inputs
        printf("%s, %s, %.2f, %.2f\n",emp[i].lastName, emp[i].firstName, emp[i].hours, emp[i].payrate);

        employeeCount++;
    }

    // Checking for input 
    for(int i = 0; i < MAXEMPLOYEES; i++){
    printf("%f\n",emp[i].hours);
    }
/**********************************************************
    Processing Loop
**********************************************************/
    for(int i = 0; i < MAXEMPLOYEES; i++){


        CalculateOvertime(emp[i].hours, &emp[i].regularHours, &emp[i].otHours);

    }

    return 0;
}

/********************************************

    1.1 InputData(in lastName, firstName as string, in hours, payrate, as real)
        This function reads inputs from the file and inputs that data into the Array of Records.

**********************************************/

void InputData(FILE * reportFile, char * lastName, char * firstName, float *hours, float *payrate){

    printf(" Reading  new employee data...\n");

    fscanf(reportFile, "%s", lastName);

    fscanf(reportFile, "%s", firstName);

    fscanf(reportFile, "%f", hours);

    fscanf(reportFile, "%f", payrate);


}

void CalculateOvertime(float hours, float * regularHours, float * otHours){


printf(" Hours are : ", "%f", hours);


    if (hours > 40)
    {

        *regularHours = 40;
        *otHours = (hours - 40);
    }
    else
    {

        *regularHours = hours;
        *otHours = 0;
    }

}

I'm pretty new to programming and feel like its a simple fix, but I haven't been able to figure out whats wrong. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Answer 1

From what I can tell it looks like your program (both here and on repl.it) are doing exactly what you have programmed. When I read the description of your data it says "Lastname, Firstname, Payrate and Hours " However, when you read the data in your program you are reading: "emp[i].lastName, emp[i].firstName, &emp[i]. hours , &emp[i]. payrate ". You have reversed the payrate and hours fields in your read. It's a simply mistake and easy to make. My experience is the easiest problems are often to hardest to spot. I've certainly spend my share of hours puzzled over similar bugs.