Simplifying does not mean incorrect. Initializing the variable would not add appreciable complexity to the code. It's a snippet and should be fixed lest it make the author appear incompetent.
I'm not 100% confident, but I'm pretty sure the author does not care if you think they're incompetent. The author's skill and apparent interest is in explaining an inherently difficult concept (reverse engineering a complied executable) in a way that won't cause their audience (not you) to tune out and/or go running for the hills.
Could they adjust the snippet? Sure. Will it add anything to the essay to do so? Nope.
Eh... I'm not really buying it. I think it was an honest mistake. C'mon; this makes that snippet harder to read?
char input[SIZE];
I really don't think so. I'm all for simplifying example code to get the core concept across, but I wouldn't go as far as to invoke undefined behavior. I also don't understand the use of scanf. At all. A seasoned, competent C user would never consider using scanf.
Anyway, I didn't mean to derail things too much here. It's really a nitpick and has little to do with the article itself.
Forget the author appearing competent, this is a primer. Primers should have code you can copy and paste and be correct every time. Most beginner following along running into a weird issue with the program they're using to reverse engineer before even getting to the fun part are just going to give up.
