status = scanf("%d%d", &x, &y);        
     

• scanf reads from standard input

• (1) reads data from the standard input, skipping leading whitespace;
  (2) converts the input to the appropriate type according to given format specification, and
  (3) stores the result into corresponding address location.

• %d in the format string means read characters from input and convert to an integer and store at the location specified by the next argument.

• &x evaluates to the address of the int variable x; so the converted input value will be stored in x.

• this scanf will read two character strings of digits, convert them to two binary integers and store these integers in variables x and y

• the return value of scanf is the number of successful input conversions;
  in this example the variable status will be assigned 2 if both inputs are valid integers.