Question

I want to rewrite the “cp” command of Linux. So this program will work like #./a.out originalfile copiedfile. I can open the file, create new file but can’t write the new file. Nothing is written. What could be the reason?

The current C code is:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <unistd.h>

int main(int argc,char *aa[]){
    int fd,fd1;
    char buffer[100];

    if(argc!=3){
        printf("Usage : ./a.out <original> <copy> \n");
        return -1;
    }

    fd=open(aa[1],O_RDONLY,S_IRUSR);
    if(fd==-1){
        printf("file not found.\n");
        return -1;
    }
    fd1=open(aa[2],O_CREAT | O_WRONLY,S_IRUSR);
    if(fd1!=-1){
        printf("file is created.\n");
    }
    ssize_t n;
    while(n=read(fd,buffer,50)){
        write(fd1,buffer,n);
        printf("..writing..\n");
    }
    close(fd);
    close(fd1);
}

Answer 1

You need to write() the read() data into the new file:

ssize_t nrd;
int fd;
int fd1;

fd = open(aa[1], O_RDONLY);
fd1 = open(aa[2], O_CREAT | O_WRONLY, S_IRUSR | S_IWUSR);
while (nrd = read(fd,buffer,50)) {
    write(fd1,buffer,nrd);
}

close(fd);
close(fd1);

Update: added the proper opens…

Btw, the O_CREAT can be OR’d (O_CREAT | O_WRONLY). You are actually opening too many file handles. Just do the open once.