Why "Returns a string of length - 1 byte"?

Question

PHP

php.net/manual/en/function.fgets.php
string fgets ( resource $handle [, int $length ] )

Returns a string of length - 1 bytes read from the file descriptor pointed to by the handle parameter.

Why else is this? So fgets($handle, 1) will return an empty string? (1 - 1 == 0)?

Answer 1

I guess for compatibility with the fgets C function, where the last character is reserved for \0.