Question about shared memory

Hello! I'm trying to learn how to use shared memory, so I wrote a simple program to exchange an integer value between a parent process and its child.
The problem is that the program doesn't work, because regardless of the number that I write into the shared memory the child always reads 0. This is the code:

Code:

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#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <signal.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <sys/shm.h>

sig_atomic_t flag = 0;

void handler(int signum){
        flag = 1;
}

int main(){

        int key, num;
        int *mem;
        pid_t childpid;

        key = shmget(IPC_PRIVATE, sizeof(int), IPC_CREAT | IPC_EXCL | S_IRUSR | S_IWUSR);
        mem = (int*) shmat(key, 0, 0);

        signal(SIGUSR1, handler);

        printf("Write an integer and press enter...\n");
        scanf("%d", &num);

        childpid = fork();

        if(childpid == 0){

                while(!flag) sleep(1);
                printf("I'm the child. I've been awakened. Retrieving the number.\n");
                printf("The number is %d\n", *mem);

        } else {

                printf("I'm the father, I received the number %d. I write it in the shared memory.\n", num);
                mem = &num;
                printf("I'm awaking the child.\n");
                kill(childpid, SIGUSR1);
        }

        shmdt(mem);
        shmctl(key, IPC_RMID, 0);
        return 0;
}

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Someone can help me to find the error and explain me why it's wrong?
Thanks in advance for any help!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Soel

Code:

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        mem = (int*) shmat(key, 0, 0);
...
                mem = #

---

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by man shmat

If shmaddr is NULL, the system chooses a suitable (unused) address at which to attach the segment.

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Your shmat call picks a random address to share and stores it in mem. Later, you assign to mem the address of num. This doesn't share num, it just causes you to lose your handle to the shared memory. Try the following (changes are in bold):

Code:

---

    int key, *num;  // num is now a pointer
    int *mem;
...
    mem = (int*) shmat(key, 0, 0);
    num = mem;  // make num point to the shared memory location
...
    scanf("%d", num);

    childpid = fork();

    if (childpid == 0) {
        while(!flag) sleep(1);
        printf("I'm the child. I've been awakened. Retrieving the number.\n");
        printf("The number is %d\n", *num);

    }
    else {
        printf("I'm the father, I received the number %d. I write it in the shared memory.\n", *num);

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Nice post, Anduril. :D

Thanks!

Thanks, but I was following an exercise that asked to read a number from the stdin, store it in a local variable in the parent process and then pass it to the child through the shared memory.
Maybe the right solution was to use a memcpy(mem, &num, sizeof(int))?

It would be easier to just do a simple assignment:

Code:

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*mem = num

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Ugh. Why do books continue to teach, and programmers continue to use, SYSV shared memory? Shared memory-mapped files are in all ways completely superior.