Getting list of files into array

[AIXSPadmin]

My knowledge of C is limited and for the task I am trying to do I cannot use Korn shell. Given that, how would I get a list of files into an array and print them to the screen and give the user a choice of which one to choose to delete.

Example:

If there was a core file in /home /tmp /usr/WebSphere /sft/iplanet

I want to list the files and prompt them to delete them:

Do you want to delete /home/core (Y/N)?

And loop through until all files have been read. I can do this easily in Korn, but as I said my C is rough.

Thanks for any help.

 

[marsd]

This really seems like something that the shell has
better high level facilties for than a standalone C
program. An array is not an ideal data structure for
doing what you want in any case. You would have to
allocate a very large static array, or use dynamic
allocation for a char **array which requires a
resizing algorithm and some overhead. A linked list
is better. Proper error handling is an ordeal with C
for systems operations like these.

In any case there are no ansi C libs for directory
searches and the posix opendir() family may not be
usable for you, I don't know your platform. In
addition I assume you would want a recursive search
of the chosen directories?

Having said all this: perl,tcl and python are good
candidates for this job as they offer high level
interfaces and enough power and speed to do the
job.

 

[AIXSPadmin]

Thanks for your input, but if you can bear with me, this is what I have, however, it is not deleting the file that I prompt for. I am on AIX by the way. Thanks.

#include <stdio.h>
FILE *inf;
char s[80];
int line;

void cleartoendofline(void);

void cleartoendofline(void)
{
char ch;
ch = getchar();
while( ch != '\n' )
ch = getchar();
}

main () {
setuid(0);
system(&quot;find /home /tmp /usr/WebSphere -type f -name core > /tmp/findcore.txt&quot;
line=0;
inf = fopen (&quot;/tmp/findcore.txt&quot;, &quot;r&quot;
if (inf == NULL) printf(&quot;Can't Open File\n&quot;
else {
while (fgets(s, 79, inf) != NULL) {
line++;
printf(&quot;File %d: %s&quot;, line, s);
Confirm(s);
}
}
}

Confirm(char s) {
char ch;
int valid_choice;

printf(&quot;Do you want to remove this file? \n&quot;
valid_choice = 0;
while( valid_choice == 0 ) {
printf(&quot;Continue (Y/N)? &quot;
scanf(&quot; %c&quot;, &ch );
ch = toupper(ch);
if((ch == 'Y') || (ch == 'N'))
valid_choice = 1;
if ( valid_choice == 1 )
unlink(&quot;%s&quot;, s);
else
printf(&quot;\007Error: Invalid choice\n&quot;
cleartoendofline();
}
}

 

[marsd]

There are problems with your confirm() function...
You could try something trivial like this..

int confirm(char *s) {
int pret;
char ch;
begin:
         printf("\nWould you like to delete: %s (y/n)?",s);
         scanf(" %c", &ch);
           
        if (ch == 'n') {
               return 0;
        }
           
        if (ch == 'y') {   
           if ( (pret = unlink(s)) < 0) {
               perror(&quot;unlink() in confirm()&quot;);
               return -1;
           } else {
               return 1;
           }
        }
printf(&quot;Invalid choice!\n&quot;);
goto begin;
}

This gives you some error checks.

 

[AIXSPadmin]

Very much appreciated, thank you!

 

[abp]

This is a round about way to achieve what you want.
Check out the header files <dirent.h> or <unistd.h>
in your AIX system. Either of them would have defined
functions to open and traverse directories. I think
the function name is &quot;readdir&quot; if you are having dirent.h.

Once you have opened a directory, you can traverse it.

Here is how a dirent sturcture is defined in SunOS.

struct dirent {
ino_t d_ino;
off_t d_off;
unsigned short d_reclen;
char d_name[1];
};



I suggest you try 'man readdir' or 'man dirent' at a console
for getting proper information on traversing directories.

Regards

Anand Pillai
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