working with files

[kristy]

A while back I created a very simple shell script that basicly (together with a few other things) compiles all the .java files in a directory. Now I want to re-write this shell script in C. This means I'll work with files, and I need to find a way to retrieve the files' name, size etc. Is there a simple way to do this? - Other than forking a lot of UNIX commands..

Oh, and I haven't found a simple way to get information with fork(), just run UNIX commands and pass/get arguments, which isn't quite the same.

Help and advice appreciated.

[Salem]

> Now I want to re-write this shell script in C.
I hope this is a "for the fun" exercise, because it's a waste of effort for pratical purposes.
As a shell script, it takes about 30 seconds to write and is dead easy to maintain and enhance.
You could spend hours on writing the equivalent C program for no real gain.

But if you're still interested, then perhaps this will help.

It sounds like what you really need is make

[kristy]

Originally posted by Salem
You could spend hours on writing the equivalent C program for no real gain.

That was my conclusion a bit later too. I did hope it would run a bit faster, but figured it wasn't worth all the effort when the shell script could do the job (better) in a few lines. Thanks for the tip and the links.