need a bit of help with my C program please

hi there!

Im completely stuck at this point and any help whatsoever would be great.

ive got 3 main problems.
- determining the number of lines in a file
- getting rid of a newline character at the end of a string
- converting a time_t variable to a string

heres the code:

Code:

---


#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <time.h>

typedef struct
{
        char name[256];
        u_short mode;
        short user_id;
        short group_id;
        off_t size;
        char time_last_mod[50];
} file_sig;

main(int argc, char **argv)
{
        struct stat file_info;
        file_sig files[3]; //** need to make the files array = to the number of filenames, that is the number of lines in the input file **//       
        int i=0;

        FILE *fptr;
        char filename[200];
        fptr = fopen(argv[1], "r");
        fgets(filename, 200, fptr); //** need to get rid of the newline character at the end of filename **//

        while (!feof(fptr))
        {       
                stat(filename, &file_info); //** doesnt work cos of the newline character **//
                time (&file_info.st_mtime);

                files[i].name=filename; //** doesnt work cos they are incompatible data types due to newline character **//
                files[i].mode=file_info.st_mode;
                files[i].user_id=file_info.st_uid;
                files[i].group_id=file_info.st_gid;
                files[i].size=file_info.st_size;
                files[i].time_last_mod=ctime(&file_info.st_mtime); //** doesnt work because they are incompatible data types **//

                printf("\n\nFilename: %s",files[i].name); //** doesnt work due to previous errors **//
                      printf("Protection and Filetype: %o\n", files[i].mode);
                printf("User ID of owner: %o\n", files[i].user_id);
                      printf("Group ID of owner: %o\n", files[i].group_id);
                        printf("File Size in bytes: %o\n", files[i].size);
                        printf("Last modify time: %s\n", files[i].time_last_mod); //** doesnt work due to previous errors *//

                ++i;                       

                fgets(filename, 200, fptr); //** need to get rid of the newline character at the end of filename again **//
        }
        fclose(fptr);
}

---

any help would be great :)

-Sandy

for converting time_t to string couldnt you do this:
char str;
time_t mytime;
mytime = time(NULL);
strcpy(str,mytime);

not sure if it will work but it should.

-Luke

Quote:

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Originally posted by Lynux-Penguin
for converting time_t to string couldnt you do this:
char str;
time_t mytime;
mytime = time(NULL);
strcpy(str,mytime);

not sure if it will work but it should.

-Luke

---

How on earth would this work?

1) 'str' is just a single character.
2) 'time_t' is basicly a long integer.
3) strcpy( str, mytime ) just copies the time value into a single character.

[edit] Except in this case, it would use the value in 'mytime' as a pointer, and really screw you over. Actually you'd get some severe warnings when you compiled here. [/edit]

4) This still doesn't give you the current time. It gives you a huge number, assuming it worked.

Quzah.

thanks for the help but it didnt really help :/

st_mtime is supposed to give the modify time of the file, which is this long messed up integer... im trying to make that into a readable string...

thanks anyway tho :)

-Sandy

>file_sig files[3];
>determining the number of lines in a file
Your program only performs a stat() then prints the data. In this case there's no need to have an array of file_sig structs, one will do. Just reuse it in each iteration of the loop.
However, if you are going to expand this prog, post again and I'll help you get round this one.

>files[i].name=filename; //** doesn't work cos they are incompatible data types due to newline character **//
No. It doesn't work because you can't copy strings from one array to another in this manner. Use strncpy().

>getting rid of a newline character at the end of a string
Easy, just blat over it with a '\0'. Something like
>filename[strlen(filename)-1] = '\0';

>converting a time_t variable to a string
ctime() does that for you, but it returns a pointer to a static variable held within the ctime function (I believe). If you want to store your own copy, just strcpy into another variable. As in:

Code:

---

time_t time_of_day;
char buf[30];
time_of_day = time( NULL );
strncpy (buf, ctime( &time_of_day), 30);
printf( "It is now: %s" ,  buf);

---

Be warned, the ctime() function leaves a trailing newline character in the string, if you don't want it, just use the same code to remove as per the filename example.

Other observations:
>while (!feof(fptr))
try to use the return code from fgets() to determine when the end of a file is reached.

>fptr = fopen(argv[1], "r");
Always ensure the fptr is not NULL before using it You don't do any validation, so your prog will crash and burn if you don't have access or the file is missing. (probably core)

>stat(filename, &file_info)
Again, check the return code from stat to ensure the call worked before using the values in the file_info struct. If the call failed, I don't believe the contents of file_info are guaranteed.