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FILEATTR
. Summary
fileattr(str <filespec>);
. Description
Under the MS-DOS file system, files have a certain attributes which
can determine their functions or the way certain things behave. For
example if a file has the 'hidden' bit set as part of its attribute
byte, when you do a DOS dir command, the file is not shown. Simi-
larly, if a file has the read only bit set, you may not overwrite
it.
The fileattr function returns an integer value representing the at-
tributes of a specified file. <filespec> is the name of the file and
may include a drive and directory portion, as well as the DOS wild-
card characters * and ?.
The value returned is a total of the following attributes.
1 Read only file.
2 Hidden file. The file is not listed when the DOS dir com-
mand is executed.
4 System file. The file is not listed when the DOS dir com-
mand is executed.
8 Volume label. This is the volume name of the disk.
16 Subdirectory. This is a subdirectory name.
32 Archive bit. This is set by DOS whenever a file has been
written to and is then used by some backup software to
check if a file has been modified since last backed-up.
Each of these values is a certain bit in a byte. To test for the ex-
istence of an attribute, the bitwise AND operator should be used.
For example, the following fragment would check if the read only bit
in an attribute is set:
if (attrib & 1)
...
If <filespec> is blank (""), then the attributes of the last file
found with the filefind function is returned. Note that calling
filesize or filetime in the meantime with a non-blank filename would
instead make this call return the attributes of files found with
those functions, as they use the same buffer.
. Return Value
An integer value representing the combined attributes of the in-
dicated file is returned, or a value of -1 is returned if the in-
dicated file could not be found.
. Example
int attr;
str filename[64];
gets(filename, 64);
attr = fileattr(filename);
if (attr & 6) // system _and_ hidden added together
prints("This file is marked as hidden and system");
See Also:
filefind
filesize
filetime
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