I have to write a shell program in c that doesn't use the system() function. One of the features is that we have to be able to use wild cards. I can't seem to find a good example of how to use glob or this fnmatch functions that I have been running into so I have been messing around and so far I have a some what working blog feature (depending on how I have arranged my code).
If I have a glob variable declared as a global then the function partially works. However any command afterwards produces in error. example:
ls *.c
produce correct results
ls -l //no glob required
null passed through
so I tried making it a local variable. This is my code right now:
int runCommand(commandStruct * command1) {
if(!globbing)
execvp(command1->cmd_path, command1->argv);
else{
glob_t globbuf;
printf("globChar: %s\n", globChar);
glob(globChar, GLOB_DOOFFS, NULL, &globbuf);
//printf("globbuf.gl_pathv[0]: %s\n", &globbuf.gl_pathv[0]);
execvp(command1->cmd_path, &globbuf.gl_pathv[0]);
//globfree(&globbuf);
globbing = 0;
}
return 1;
}
When doing this with the globbuf as a local, it produces a null for globbuf.gl_path[0]. Can't seem to figure out why. Anyone with a knowledge of how glob works know what might be the cause? Can post more code if necessary but this is where the problem lies.
this works for me:
...
glob_t glob_buffer;
const char * pattern = "/tmp/*";
int i;
int match_count;
glob( pattern , 0 , NULL , &glob_buffer );
match_count = glob_buffer.gl_pathc;
printf("Number of mathces: %d \n", match_count);
for (i=0; i < match_count; i++)
printf("match[%d] = %s \n",i,glob_buffer.gl_pathv[i]);
globfree( &glob_buffer );
...
Observe that the execvp function expects the argument list to end with a NULL pointer, i.e. I think it will be the easiest to create your own char ** argv copy with all the elements from the glob_buffer.gl_pathv[] and a NULL pointer at the end.