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I've been wondering how scanf()/printf() actually works in the hardware and OS levels. Where does the data flow and what exactly is the OS doing around these times? What calls does the OS make? And so on...
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In C programming language, scanf is a function that stands for Scan Formatted String. It reads data from stdin (standard input stream i.e. usually keyboard) and then writes the result into the given arguments. It accepts character, string, and numeric data from the user using standard input.
scanf() and printf() are functions in libc (the C standard library), and they call the read() and write() operating system syscalls respectively, talking to the file descriptors stdin and stdout respectively (fscanf and fprintf allow you to specify the file stream you want to read/write from).
The scanf() function returns the number of fields that were successfully converted and assigned. The return value does not include fields that were read but not assigned. The return value is EOF for an attempt to read at end-of-file if no conversion was performed. A return value of 0 means that no fields were assigned.
The scanf("%d",&number) statement reads integer number from the console and stores the given value in number variable. The printf("cube of number is:%d ",number*number*number) statement prints the cube of number on the console.
scanf() and printf() are functions in libc (the C standard library), and they call the read() and write() operating system syscalls respectively, talking to the file descriptors stdin and stdout respectively (fscanf and fprintf allow you to specify the file stream you want to read/write from).
Calls to read() and write() (and all syscalls) result in a 'context switch' out of your user-level application into kernel mode, which means it can perform privileged operations, such as talking directly to hardware. Depending on how you started the application, the 'stdin' and 'stdout' file descriptors are probably bound to a console device (such as tty0), or some sort of virtual console device (like that exposed by an xterm). read() and write() safely copy the data to/from a kernel buffer called a 'uio'.
The format-string conversion part of scanf and printf does not occur in kernel mode, but just in ordinary user mode (inside 'libc'), the general rule of thumb with syscalls is you switch to kernel mode as infrequently as possible, both to avoid the performance overhead of context switching, and for security (you need to be very careful about anything that happens in kernel mode! less code in kernel mode means less bugs/security holes in the operating system).
btw.. all of this was written from a unix perspective, I don't know how MS Windows works.
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On my OS I am working with scanf and printf are based on functions getch() ant putch().
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