Command Line Argument C - c

I need help to display name to command line like this (I don't know how to explain) in C
$:Enter your name: Test
$:Test>
But when you continue press enter it still showing Test>
$:Test>
$:Test>
So how do we get argv[0] and do something like this (Sorry that I cannot explain probably)
Thank you

command line arguments are stored in char **argv, and there are argc of them.
int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
int i=0;
for(i=0; i< argc; i++)
printf("argument number %d = %s\n", i, argv[i]);
return 0;
}
argv[0] is the name of the program being executed, so argc is always at least == 1 ( or more)

If you had rather shell-like program in mind, maybe the following couldbe of use:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdbool.h>
#define BUFSIZE 64
int main() {
char prompt[BUFSIZE];
char command[BUFSIZE];
char *prefix = "$:";
char *suffix = ">";
printf("%s%s%s", prefix, "Enter your name:", suffix);
fgets(prompt, BUFSIZE, stdin);
prompt[strlen(prompt)-1] = '\0'; // get rid of the \n
while (true) {
printf("%s%s%s", prefix, prompt, suffix);
fgets(command, BUFSIZE, stdin);
if (strncmp(command,"Quit",4) == 0)
break;
}
return 0;
}

Whenever possible, you should use getopt() so that the order of your parameters doesn't matter. For example, suppose you wanted to take an integer parameter for the size, an integer for the mode of execution, and a toggle to indicate whether to run in "quiet mode" or not. Further suppose that "-h" should print help and exit. Code like this will do the trick. The "s:m:hq" string indicates that "-s" and "-m" provide parameters, but the other flags don't.
int main() {
// parse the command-line options
int opt;
int size = DEFAULT_SIZE, mode = DEFAULT_MODE, quiet = 0;
while ((opt = getopt(argc, argv, "s:m:hq")) != -1) {
switch (opt) {
case 's': size = atoi(optarg); break;
case 'm': mode = atoi(optarg); break;
case 'q': quiet = 1; break;
case 'h': usage(); return 0;
}
}
// rest of code goes here
}
Of course, you should add error checking in case optarg is null.
Also, if you're using C++, "string(optarg)" is an appropriate way for your case statement to set a std::string to hold a value that is stored as a char* in argv.

Related

Getopt not grabbing and storing my input in C

This is my first post on this site so please forgive any formatting errors.
I am coding a small program to get simple information from a file like amount of words, sorting it etc. However I started simply by using getopt since I want to use the command line to parse my commands. This is what I have so far.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int value = 0;
int main(int argc, char **argv) {
extern char *optarg;
extern int optind;
int c, err = 0;
int cflag = 0, sflag = 0, fflag = 0;
char *substring;
// usage from instructions in case of error
static char usage[] = "usage: mywords [-cs] [-f substring] filename";
// only f flag requires additional input
while ((c = getopt(argc, argv, "csf:")) != -1)
switch (c) {
case 'c':
cflag = 1;
break;
case 's':
sflag = 1;
break;
case 'f':
fflag = 1;
printf("Before assigning to substring\n");
substring = optarg;
printf("After\n");
break;
case '?':
err = 1;
break;
}
if (fflag = 1) {
printf("%c ", &substring);
}
}
I will then input something like this to the command line after I run my makefile (which runs successfully with no errors):
mywords -f test
and ideally the output would be
test
The printf statements I have in the fflag are simple test prints to see if I was even reaching there. Thank you for your help in advance.
EDIT
It was fixed. David Collins had the right answer. Thank you so much everyone
I have noticed three issues in you code. (There may be other small issues but addressing the following should get you up and running I think.)
Testing for equality
You should use if (fflag == 1) instead of if (fflag = 1).
Pointer de-referencing
If you want to retrieve the value of the character pointed to by substring, you would use *substring instead of &substring.
But you probably don't want to do this. See below.
printf() format specifiers
When printing a string / character array, use the %s specifier instead of %c. (%c is for single characters). So you should have
if (fflag == 1) {
printf("%s ", substring);
}
Or - more simply - just
if (fflag) {
puts(substring)
}
since any non-zero value evaluates to true in C (and you initialize fflag to zero at the start of your program).

What is the easiest way to parse arguments from a file in C?

Consider a file ArgumentFile.txt
int a=100;
int b[3] = { 5, 2, 5 };
double c = 0.0014;
And the main code code.c
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
if (argc > 1) FILE *f = fopen(argv[1], "r");
ParseFile(f); // Set the parameters based on file
DoStuff(a,b,c); // Run the process based on the parsed arguments
}
A user could then pass arguments by doing
./CodeExecutable ArgumentFile.txt
Is there a standard solution to parse arguments from file? It would be an equivalent of getopt which parse arguments from command line?
You do not need an equivalent to getopt() you can use exactly getopt(). The getopt() function does not specifically process command line arguments; it will process any array of pointers to strings in the style of command line arguments.
#define MAX_ARGS 256
#define MAX_FILE_LEN 4096
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
if( argc > 1 )
{
FILE *f = fopen(argv[1], "r");
if( f != 0 )
{
char fargs[MAX_FILE_LEN] = "" ;
fread( fargs, 1, MAX_FILE_LEN, f ) ;
// Build fargv from file content
char* fargv[MAX_ARGS] ;
int fargc = 0 ;
fargv[fargc] = strtok( fargs, " \n\r" ) ;
while( fargc < MAX_ARGS && fargv[fargc] != 0 )
{
fargc++ ;
fargv[fargc] = strtok( 0, "\n\r" ) ;
}
// Process fargv using getopt()
while( (char c = getopt( fargc, fargv, "a:b:c:")) != -1 )
{
switch( c )
{
...
}
}
}
}
...
return 0 ;
}
It is probably better to dynamically allocate fargs using teh actual file length, but the above is illustrative only.
Your input file might then look like:
-a 100
-b 5,2,5
-c 0.0014
The getopt() loop will then have to process the arguments as necessary - using sscanf() for example.
switch( c )
{
case 'a' : sscanf( optarg, "%i", a ) ; break ;
case 'b' : sscanf( optarg, "%i,%i,%i", b[0], b[1], b[2] ) ; break ;
case 'c' : sscanf( optarg, "%f", c ) ; break ;
}
DoStuff( a, b, c ) ;
I use getopt(). Here is an example that allows for some more flexibility. This example demonstrates how th handle for optional optarg and multiple optargs.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <string.h>
void usage(void)
{
printf("usage: \n"
"This example demonstrates how to add flexibility to the traditional linux getopt()\n"
"This help text is printed if the program is executed without arguments\n"
"or with an invalid argument configuration.\n"
"to view the help file run without arguments or with -h\n"
"Oterwise the program accepts two options: -d, -u\n"
"-d: can come with 0 or one option argument\n"
"-u: can come with one or more option arguments\n"
"try this to see the output:\n"
"./test -d aaa -u ccc 4 \"quoted multi token string\" -d -u\n");
}
int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
char data[101];
int opt;
memset(data, 0, 101);
while ((opt = getopt(argc, argv, "hd:u:t:")) != -1) {
switch (opt) {
case 'h':
usage();
return 0;
case 'd': // can accept 0 or 1 parameters
if (optarg[0] == '-') { //not an optarg of ours...
optind--;
printf("option: -d. no tokens (another option follows)\n");
break;
}
strncpy(data, optarg, 100);
printf("option: -d. tokens: %s\n", data);
break;
case 'u': //can accept one or more parameters ...
strncpy(data, optarg, 100);
printf("option: -u. tokens: %s", data);
//do we have more arguments for 'u'?
while( optind <= argc && argv[optind][0] != '-') {
strncpy(data, argv[optind], 100);
printf(", %s", data);
optind++;
}
printf(".\n");
break;
case ':': //this happens if we got an option which expects an arg without any optarg.
if(optopt == 'd') {//lets allow a '-d' without its optarg
printf("option: -d. no tokens\n");
break;
}
//otherwise fall through to the default handler
default: //covers ':' '?' for missing value, '-h' for help, etc.
printf("on error you get: opt=%c. optopt=%c opterr=%d\n", opt, optopt, opterr);
return 0;
}
}
return 0;
}
You can't do that using plain C code. You'll have to write platform specific assembly language code to handle that.
Your best option is to use the C proprocessor.
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
#include "myfile.txt"
// Do Stuff
}
Having said that, I don't know what you would gain by that instead of putting the contents of myfile.txt in main() directly.

Getopt and Optarg

Hi I am working on a Program in a book. The Program is working almost as it is supposed to, except for one mistake. Every time I try to use the "-l" case I get a Segmentation Fault. Any Ideas?
#include <stdio.h>
#include <unistd.h>
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
char *lieferung = "";
int knusprig = 0;
int zahl = 0;
char ch;
while ((ch = getopt(argc, argv, "l : k")) != EOF){
switch (ch) {
case 'l':
lieferung = optarg;
break;
case 'k':
knusprig = 1;
break;
default:
fprintf(stderr, "Unbekannte Option: '%s'\n", optarg);
return 1;
}
}
argc -= optind;
argv += optind;
if (knusprig)
puts("Knuspriger Rand.");
if (lieferung[0])
printf("Zu liefern: %s.\n", lieferung);
puts("Zutaten:");
for (zahl = 0; zahl < argc; zahl++)
puts(argv[zahl]);
return 0;
}
Thanks in advance.
The third argument get getopt shouldn't contain any spaces. Because there are spaces, it reads this argument as "-l takes no argument, -(space) takes an argument, -(space) takes no argument, and -k takes no argument.
Since getopt doesn't expect -l to pass an argument, optarg is set to NULL, which you then subsequently assign to lieferung. You then dereference that variable, resulting in the segfault.
Git rid of the spaces in the format string:
while ((ch = getopt(argc, argv, "l:k")) != EOF){
I think the format is incorrect. Replace "l : k" with "l:k".

Segmentation fault when parsing command line arguments

I am getting a segmentation fault I am having trouble isolating the source of the fault. I believe that for some reason argv and argc are not getting values, but I cannot figure out why.
Here is the first part of my code.
int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
int i;
int numArrays = 0;
int test = 0;
int opt = 0;
printf ("Parsing....\n"); // This line gets printed
printf(argv); // this one doesn't even if being flushed immediately after
printf(argc); // when the previous line is deleted, this line also won't print
fflush(stdout);
opt = getopt(argc, argv, optString); // defined as optString = "qmc";
while (opt != -1) {
printf (opt);
switch (opt) {
//prevents program from printing to a file
case 'q':
tofile = 1;
break;
// max size of the prime numbers
case 'm':
maxPrime = atoi(optarg);
break;
case 'c':
numProcs = atoi(optarg);
break;
default:
break;
}
}
I'm tried to figure out what is going on, but I cannot see why argc and argv are not getting values. I have used this exact same parsing code before and it has worked perfectly. Usually segmentation faults are pretty easy (accessing memory locations you shouldn't be), but there is no reason I shouldn't have access to my command line arguments.
You are confused about how to use printf. What you're currently doing is a big no-no:
printf(argv);
printf(argc);
The function expects a const char* string that specifies the format of the output and optional variable argument list. You are passing a double-pointer, which is not a string, and an integer, which is not even a pointer!
You want something like this:
printf( "Number of arguments: %d\n", argc );
for( int i = 0; i < argc; i++ ) {
printf( "Arg %d: %s\n", i, argv[i] );
}
Read up on printf here: http://en.cppreference.com/w/c/io/fprintf

C using getOpt to parse multiple arguments

I need to use getopt to parse the following command:
./center -n name –cp Anumber –i Anumber –t Anumber –s Anumber -fc nameOfaFile
All of them can be given out in any order.
So its clear i have to use getOpt.
So i have been investigation and this is what i have so far
void check_parameters (int argc, char** argv) {
int opt;
while((opt = getopt(argc, argv, "n:cp:i:c:fc:")) != -1) {
printf("give me opt %c \n", opt)
swicth(opt){
case 'n' :
//do something
case 'cp' :
//do something
case 'i' :
//do something
}
}
}
I do know for a fact that the 3 parameter: the OptString is where i tell getOpt what are the char of the options it should expect
Also in optarg is where the argument is
its not working!
when i printf( "give me opt %c", opt ) its giving me the numbers, not the char!
for this reason it does not work. it does not check the parameters correctly
Edit:
After doing man 3 getopt
the return value of getopt is: If an option was successfully found, then getopt() returns the option character. If all command-line options have been parsed, then getopt() returns -1.
it returns the option character? it always return integer 1. always! i don't understand how getopt works. how does the switch compare to characters?!
First of all, this:
case 'cp':
...makes no sense. You can't represent two characters with a char or int. Besides, if running your program with -cp 101, getopt will treat it as -c p 101, for a completely different result. If you want to use long options, use getopt_long instead and the appropriate calling syntax, per example: ./a.out -n 42 --cp 101.
Now, here's a working example of getopt() in action:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <getopt.h>
int main(int argc, char* argv[]) {
int opt;
while((opt = getopt(argc, argv, "n:cp:i:c:fc:")) != -1) {
switch (opt){
case 'n':
printf("n was %s\n", optarg);
break;
case 'i':
printf("i was %s\n", optarg);
break;
}
}
return 0;
}
getopt handles only single-character option names, not things like -cp or -fc (which it interprets as multiple option flags in a single string: -c -p, -f -c). If you want to stick to the syntax you defined, then it's easier to just roll your own:
// first check whether argc is odd, then:
for (i = 1; i < argc; i += 2) {
if (strcmp(argv[i], "n") == 0) {
name = argv[i+1];
} else if (strcmp(argv[i], "cp") == 0) {
// etc. etc.
}
}

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