A temporary storage area is called a buffer. All standard input and output devices contain an input and output buffer. In standard C/C++, streams are buffered. For example, in the case of standard input, when we press the key on the keyboard, it isn’t sent to your program, instead of that, it is sent to the buffer by the operating system, till the time is allotted to that program.
How does it affect Programming?
On various occasions, you may need to clear the unwanted buffer so as to get the next input in the desired container and not in the buffer of the previous variable. For example, in the case of C after encountering “scanf()”, if we need to input a character array or character, and in the case of C++, after encountering the “cin” statement, we require to input a character array or a string, we require to clear the input buffer or else the desired input is occupied by a buffer of the previous variable, not by the desired container. On pressing “Enter” (carriage return) on the output screen after the first input, as the buffer of the previous variable was the space for a new container(as we didn’t clear it), the program skips the following input of the container.
In the case of C Programming