Reading a directory --code from FAQ

hello everybody

I had a question which i found an answear to on the
FAQ however C is my first programming language and i
dont really understand it all. Can somebody explain
a few things please.

This is the code i found;

Code:

---



/*
 * This program displays the names of all files in the current directory.
 */




#include <dirent.h>
#include <stdio.h>

int main(void)
{
  DIR          *d;                  /*what does this mean?*/
  struct dirent *dir;                 
  d = opendir(".");                    /* and this*/
  if (d)
  {
    while ((dir = readdir(d)) != NULL)
    {
      printf("%s\n", dir->d_name);            /* and this (dir->d_name)*/
    }

    closedir(d);
  }

  return(0);
}

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I guess i just wanna understand how the code works and how i can chage the directory
it looks into.

Quote:

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DIR *d; /*what does this mean?*/

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A pointer to a DIR structure. It contains information about the current directory entry which is later accessed

Quote:

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printf("%s\n", dir->d_name); /* and this (dir->d_name)*/

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here.

Quote:

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I guess i just wanna understand how the code works and how i can chage the directory
it looks into.

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It's this line:

Quote:

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d = opendir("."); /* and this*/

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"." is the current directory. You can change this to an absolute or relative path to your liking.

Have a look at how struct's, struct & pointer's works in C and come back to DIR .

ssharish2005

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ssharish2005

Have a look at how struct's, struct & pointer's works in C and come back to DIR .

ssharish2005

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He may know what they are, he just doesn't know what their purpose is, seeing as how he commented the typedef'd DIR instead of the struct.

Code:

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DIR          *d;                  /*what does this mean?*/

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It's just so clear that is a pointer variable of some Struct doesn't matter it is typedef struct DIR

Code:

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printf("%s\n", dir->d_name);            /* and this (dir->d_name)*/

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And this ???????

Code:

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code from FAQ

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ssharish2005

Hey! C'mon ssharish2005

If you need an ego boost do something clever instead of picking on noobs
for your thrills!

If you aint got nothing constructive to add why bother!!



Oh, and thanks to OnionKnight