Question

I am trying to reproduce the pipes in a shell. for example ls | sort
At first I am trying the pipes but I can’t get the parent to read the result of what the child has executed:

//pipes essai
# include <stdio.h>
# include <stdlib.h>
# include <unistd.h>
# include <sys/types.h>
# include <sys/wait.h>
# include <assert.h>
# include <string.h>
# include <sys/stat.h>
# include <fcntl.h>

enum {
MaxLigne = 1024, // longueur max d'une ligne de commandes
MaxMot = MaxLigne / 2, // nbre max de mot dans la ligne
MaxDirs = 100, // nbre max de repertoire dans PATH
MaxPathLength = 512,
 // longueur max d'un nom de fichier
 };

void decouper(char *, char *, char **, int);
int spawn(char * pathname, char * mot[]);

# define PROMPT "? "

int main(int argc, char * argv[]) {
char ligne[MaxLigne];
char pathname[MaxPathLength];
char * mot[MaxMot];
char * dirs[MaxDirs];
int i, tmp, x;
int fd[2];
int t, res = 0;
char buf[1024];
char * mot2[10];

/* Decouper PATH en repertoires */
decouper(getenv("PATH"), ":", dirs, MaxDirs);

/* read the command lines and try to execute them */
for (printf(PROMPT); fgets(ligne, sizeof ligne, stdin) != 0; printf(PROMPT)) {
    decouper(ligne, " \t\n", mot, MaxMot);
    if (mot[0] == 0) // empty line
        continue;

        //launch the pipe
        int p=pipe(fd);
        assert(p>=0);


        tmp = fork(); // launch the pipe process
        if (tmp < 0) {
            perror("fork");
            continue;
        }

        if (tmp != 0) { // parent wait for end of child

            //close this side of the pipe
            close(fd[1]);
            //waiting
            while (wait(0) != tmp)
                ;
            //when finish waiting read what the child has written in the pipe
            read(fd[0], buf, sizeof(buf));
            //print the result
            printf("read %s\n", buf);
            //get back the hand to the user
            continue;

        }else if (tmp==0){

        // child

        //close this side of the pipe
        close(fd[0]);
        //close stdout
        t=close(1);
        //make sur stdout is closed
        assert(t>=0);
        //open the pipe for writing in it instead of in the stdout
        FILE * sortie=fdopen(fd[1], O_WRONLY);
        //make sure it is ok
        assert(sortie!=NULL);

        //try to execute the command
        for (i = 0; dirs[i] != 0; i++) {
            snprintf(pathname, sizeof pathname, "%s/%s", dirs[i], mot[0]);
            execv(pathname, mot);

        }
        }

        // if exec was unsuccessful
        fprintf(stderr, "%s: not found\n", mot[0]);
        exit(1);

}

    printf("Bye\n");
    return 0;

}

void decouper(char * ligne, char * separ, char * mot[], int maxmot){
int i;

mot[0] = strtok(ligne, separ);
for(i = 1; mot[i - 1] != 0; i++){
if (i == maxmot){
  fprintf(stderr, "Erreur dans la fonction decouper: trop de mots\n");
  mot[i - 1] = 0;
 }
 mot[i] = strtok(NULL, separ);
}
}

there is a problem with this line FILE * sortie=fdopen(fd[1], O_WRONLY);

pipe1.c: In function ‘main’:
pipe1.c:81:4: warning: passing argument 2 of ‘fdopen’ makes pointer from integer without a cast
/usr/include/stdio.h:303:14: note: expected ‘const char *’ but argument is of type ‘int’

but how can I make the child to output in the pipe??? freopen doesn’t work either

the result I get:
? ls
read

which means of course nothing is read. What can I do I am really out of ideas now???
thank you very much in advance

Answer 1

You are confusing the signature of fdopen with that of open.
fdopen takes a const char* as its second parameter. Try

FILE * sortie=fdopen(fd[1], "w");

Reference:

• http://linux.die.net/man/3/fdopen

---

EDIT: It appears that you are using fdopen for no valid reason. Specifically, I don’t see any use of sortie after it is initialized.

I presume that you are trying to set up standard out for the exec’d program. If that is the case, you should use dup or dup2:

close(fd[0]);
close(1);
dup(fd[1]);
close(fd[1]);

//try to execute the command
... as before

Reference:

• http://linux.die.net/man/2/dup