fread

Reads a specified number of items from the file.

Format 

#include  <stdio.h>

size_t fread  (void *ptr, size_t size_of_item,
              size_t number_items, FILE
              *file_ptr);

Arguments

ptr
A pointer to the location, within memory, where you place the information being read. The type of the object pointed to is determined by the type of the item being read.
size_of_item
The size of the items being read, in bytes.
number_items
The number of items to be read.
file_ptr
A pointer that indicates the file from which the items are to be read.

Description

The type size_t is defined in the header file <stdio.h> as follows: 
typedef unsigned int size_t

The reading begins at the current location in the file. The items read are placed in storage beginning at the location given by the first argument. You must also specify the size of an item, in bytes.

If the file pointed to by file_ptr was opened in record mode, fread will read size_of_item multiplied by number_items bytes from the file. That is, it does not necessarily read number_items records.

Return Values
n  The number of bytes read divided by size_of_item. 
0  Indicates the end-of-file or an error. 

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