this is what total needs to be done
http://www.cs.uakron.edu/~margush/210/Prog2.htm

what i can't figure out is how to input a whole line from a file into a character array. all my text shows is how to get a single word. i'm thinking it's cin.getline, but i'm not sure how the code would be written

yes it is late -_-;;

As I recall, it *should* be something like

ifstream input;
input.getline(..);

how's it all look together?
i know this is wrong cause i only get a blank line =/

#include <iostream>
#include <fstream>
using std::ios;

int main(){
const int max = 14;
char isbn[max];
std::ifstream input("somebook.dat",ios::in);
input.getline(isbn,max,'\n');
std::cout << isbn << std::endl;
return 0;
}

okay, now i got it to input, but it doesn't see the eof and goes inf. -_-;
stupid dat files

I've been playing with C for months, so I've forgotten a lot of cpp. However, I *think* something like this will allow you to read the entire file. I haven't checked your program link, so I dunno what the program requires. :)

int ch;

while((ch = input.peek()) != EOF)
{
input.getline(isbn, max, '\n');
// do something with isbn
}

input.close();

make sure you're not trying to read in more than your array can hold. Since you're using cpp, why not use the string class instead?