Question

I’m creating a simple C program that list directory contents. Does anyone know how to list only hidden? The folllowing code pulls every file from the directory and works perfect, but I only need the hidden files. Thanks.

Answer 1

On GNU/Linux, a hidden file begin with a dot.

#include <string.h>

int is_hidden(const char *name)
{
  return name[0] == '.' &&
         strcmp(name, ".") != 0 &&
         strcmp(name, "..") != 0);
}

To check if a file is read-only, it could be a good idea to use the stat function.

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

int is_readonly(const char *name)
{
  struct stat buf;

  stat(name, &buf);

  return buf->st_mode & /* ... */;
}