NetNews Offline 2/NetNews Offline Volume 2.iso/news/comp/lang/c-part1/6397

Internet Message Format | 1996-08-05 | 2.7 KB

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From: Lawrence Kirby <[e-mail]>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: HELP: UNIX's directory functions.
Date: Sat, 24 Feb 96 14:32:30 GMT
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Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <4gj6ug$[e-mail]>
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In article <4gj6ug$[e-mail]>
           [e-mail] "Adam Peterson" writes:

>[e-mail] (Kazimir Kylheku) wrote:
>
>>In article <[e-mail]>,
>>Lawrence Kirby  <[e-mail]> wrote:
>> >In article <[e-mail]>
>> >           [e-mail] "Dharmesh Patel" writes:
>> >
>> >>
>> >>Hi all!
>> >>
>> >>I need help with couple of things in C.  I need to know how the functions
>> >>opendir, readdir, closedir, and rewinddir work.  I also need to know the
>> >>elements of the struct dirent.
>> >
>> >Unfortunately these are not defined in C.
>> >
>> >>The reason for this request is that I have to write a program that
>> >>simulates the unix command 'pwd', the hard way.
>> >
>> >They are Unix/POSIX defined functions and the place to ask about them
>> >is comp.unix.programmer.
>
>>...and I might add that the revered "K&R" book does cover the basic UNIX
>>programming interface, including directory functions, stat() and other
> goodies.
>
>>It sounds like you don't have this book. Shame! :)

My copy of K&R2 has a chapter on "The UNIX System Interface". The first
paragraph makes the purpose of this chapter clear and the fact that it does
not describe standard C functions. Schildt mingles DOS specific calls with
standard C calls in his books. That does not mean that DOS specific calls
are part of C. While K&R2 is a more reliable reference it no more defines
ANSI C than do Schildt's books (at least the bits of them that Schildt
wrote).

>To answer the original question, Unix treats directories like files,
>thus the open, read, close, rewind functions.  To process a list of
>files do something like this:
>
>if opendir succeeds
>{
>  while not eof dir
>    readdir
>  closedir
>}

I don't see you using "the open, read, close, rewind functions" there! :-)
(The point is that opendir etc. almost certainly use open etc. but present
the data in a portable format).

--
-----------------------------------------
Lawrence Kirby | [e-mail]
Wilts, England | [e-mail]
-----------------------------------------