Question

Redirecting STDERR and STDOUT in C using library

Asked by: dpkpl

Hi All,

I want to execute a binary and trap the stdout and stderr . I don't have the code for the binary. I have got the solution for this on the same list which is working fine. Many Thanks to Dave.
Here's the code :
=================================
Main Program:
/*
* Sample program to demonstrate super_popen
*
* by dave madden <dhm@webvision.com>
*/
#include <stdio.h>
#include <errno.h>
#include <sys/select.h>

int
super_popen( FILE **SI_SO_SE, const char *cmd )
{
    int           si[2] = { -1, -1 };
    int           so[2] = { -1, -1 };
    int           se[2] = { -1, -1 };
    pid_t      pid;
    int           e;
    int           fd;

    /*
     * Create 3 pipes to talk to subprocess on stdin/stdout/stderr
     */
    if (pipe( si ) != 0 || pipe( so ) != 0 || pipe( se ) != 0) goto SHUTDOWN;

    if ((pid = fork( )) == -1) goto SHUTDOWN;

    if (pid) {                         /* in parent */
         wait(0);
         close( si[0] );
         close( so[1] );
         close( se[1] );
         SI_SO_SE[0] = fdopen( si[1], "w" );
         SI_SO_SE[1] = fdopen( so[0], "r" );
         SI_SO_SE[2] = fdopen( se[0], "r" );
         
         return 0;                    /* OK! */
    }

    /*
     * This is the child process...we have to fiddle around with the
     * pipe descriptors and then exec the program.
     */

    /*
     * Make sure none of our stdin/stdout/stderr descriptors are
     * on FDs 0, 1, or 2 (if they are, it'll screw things up when
     * we do the dup2()'s)
     */
    if (si[0] < 2 || so[1] < 2 || se[1] < 2) {
         int      free_index = 0;
         int      free_fds[3];
         printf( "have to (Edited by Computer101) with FDs in child\n" );
         for (fd = 3; fd < FD_SETSIZE; fd++) {
              if (fd != si[0] && fd != si[1] && fd != se[1]) {
                   free_fds[free_index++] = fd;
                   if (free_index == 3) break;
              }
         }
         if (dup2( si[0], free_fds[0] ) == -1 ||
              dup2( so[1], free_fds[1] ) == -1 ||
              dup2( se[1], free_fds[2] ) == -1) exit( errno );
         si[0] = free_fds[0];
         so[1] = free_fds[1];
         se[1] = free_fds[2];
    }
         
    /* close all other descriptors...don't want child to have copies */
    for (fd = 0; fd < FD_SETSIZE; fd++)
         if (fd != si[0] && fd != so[1] && fd != se[1]) close( fd );
   
     dup2( si[0], 0 );               /* attach pipes to FD 0, 1, and 2 */
    dup2( so[1], 1 );
    dup2( se[1], 2 );

    close( si[0] );
    close( so[1] );
    close( se[1] );

/*     write( 1, "Hello\n", 6 );
    write( 2, "World\n", 6 );
    exit( 0 );*/

    exit( execl( "/usr/bin/sh", "sh", "-c", cmd, 0 ) ); <=========My binary with arguments works fine

 SHUTDOWN:     /* something went wrong...close the pipes & etc */
    e = errno;
    close( si[0] ); close( si[1] );
    close( so[0] ); close( so[1] );
    close( se[0] ); close( se[1] );
    errno = e;
    return -1;
}

int
main( int argc, char **argv ) <========================Changed to a function in Library and called from my
{                                                                                                     application
    FILE     *child_io[3];

    if (argc != 2) {
         printf( "usage: %s <name-of-program-to-run>\n", argv[0] );
         exit( 1 );
    }

    if (super_popen( child_io, argv[1] ) == 0) {
         char      buf[256];
         
         fprintf( child_io[0], "Message to child\n" );
         fflush( child_io[0] );

         while (fgets( buf, sizeof(buf), child_io[1] ) != 0) { <================= Cannot read This Goes on endlessly
              printf( "Child STDOUT: \"%.*s\"\n", strlen(buf) - 1, buf );                           when function is called from library
         }

         while (fgets( buf, sizeof(buf), child_io[2] ) != 0) { <================= Cannot read This Goes on endlessly
              printf( "Child STDERR: \"%.*s\"\n", strlen(buf) - 1, buf );                            when function is called from library
         }
    } else {
         printf("couldn't run %s: %d (%s)\n", argv[1], errno, strerror(errno));
    }

    exit( 0 );
}





=================================

But my problem is that I want to use all this code in a static library so I converted the main function to a function and made static library using codewarrior .Now when I call this function from my application it does everything finely except that it is not able to read from the File pointers being returned in the parent process in super_popen.
My application is MACOS X application.

(Please see my comments at relevant places in the code)

In the nutshell I cannot read from child_io[1] and child_io[2] when the function is called from the library.

Can somebody please point out what the problem is ?

Thanks in Advance
Deepak Kapila

=============================================
This question has been deleted with no points refunded.  01/25/2004 09:32AM PST

Computer101
E-E Admin
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Asked On
2003-08-07 at 22:58:44ID20703610
Tags

attach

,

descriptors

,

dup2

,

stderr

,

stdout

Topic

Unix Systems Programming

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Answers

 

by: orangehead911Posted on 2003-08-08 at 00:04:03ID: 9106177

> In the nutshell I cannot read from child_io[1] and child_io[2] when the function is called from the library.

Did this code work in a context outside of a static library?

The fgets() function call will block until either a newline character is encountered, end-of-file is reached or there is an error.

Do you have a guarantee that you will receive output from child_io[1] before child_io[2]? If not, your first call to fgets() will block until either of the above mentioned conditions occur. Furthermore, according to your code, your expecting ALL output to arrive on child_io[1] and end, BEFORE ANY output is read from child_io[2].

Assuming that it did, this is the classic single thread problem. Basically, you have blocking function calls, the fgets() function call will block until either the above mentioned conditions occur.

You should create one thread per descriptor you would like to read/write to/from to be able to asynchronously access all descriptors. If you don't, you will most likely block on one descriptor, while another one produces data. How would you abritrarily know which descriptor to read from first? You wouldn't!

You can do a 'man pthread' to access the man pages for the  pthread API. I will be able to help you with the threading too, but if you already know how to handle pthreads...

I hope this helps!

orangehead

 

by: dpkplPosted on 2003-08-08 at 00:27:47ID: 9106251

Thanks for the prompt reply

Did this code work in a context outside of a static library?
>>> Yeah this code is working fine when run from the terminal I can read from the child_io[1] and child_io[2] without any problems.

The fgets() function call will block until either a newline character is encountered, end-of-file is reached or there is an error.
>>>>
I agree to this but the thing is that why the blocking is occuring only when function is called from the library.
fgets doesn't get the error,eof or newline when the function is called from the library.

Do you have a guarantee that you will receive output from child_io[1] before child_io[2]?
>>>
Yeah the guarantee is there that the output will be at both child_io[1]  and child_io[2].If we are suspicious about as to which one will recieve first we can comment one of these but still the things are same it goes on reading endlessly from the file when called from the static library.

Can you please elaborate how differently threads will resolve this problem which is fine when being run from the terminal.

Rgds
Deepak

 

by: orangehead911Posted on 2003-08-08 at 01:10:42ID: 9106418

Well, basically since you will have one thread handling each input/output descriptor, blocking on one thread will not prevent another thread from continuing its work. You would be able to read from both stdout and stderr without ever having either of them blocking affect your program (unless you want it to).

You would put each of your read loops inside a function which you will specify in the function for creation of the thread which will access the descriptor from which you wish to read.

Depending on what your trying to achieve with the redirection, you need to decide how to handle the descriptors.

Thanks,

orangehead

 

by: liddlerPosted on 2004-01-18 at 05:03:59ID: 10140086

No comment has been added lately, so it's time to clean up this TA.
I will leave a recommendation in the Cleanup topic area that this question is:

PAQ  No refund

Please leave any comments here within the next seven days.

PLEASE DO NOT ACCEPT THIS COMMENT AS AN ANSWER!

liddler
EE Cleanup Volunteer

 

by: Computer101Posted on 2004-01-25 at 09:33:47ID: 10196051

PAQed - no points refunded (of 250)

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