1glob(3C) Standard C Library Functions glob(3C)
2
6 glob, globfree - generate path names matching a pattern
7
9 #include <glob.h>
10 int glob(const char *restrict pattern, int flags,
12 int(*errfunc)(const char *epath, int eerrno),
13 glob_t *restrict pglob);
14 void globfree(glob_t *pglob);
17
20 The glob() function is a path name generator.
21 The globfree() function frees any memory allocated by glob() associated
24 with pglob.
25 pattern Argument
27 The argument pattern is a pointer to a path name pattern to be
28 expanded. The glob() function matches all accessible path names against
29 this pattern and develops a list of all path names that match. In order
30 to have access to a path name, glob() requires search permission on
31 every component of a path except the last, and read permission on each
32 directory of any filename component of pattern that contains any of the
33 following special characters:
34 * ? [
36 pglob Argument
39 The structure type glob_t is defined in the header <glob.h> and
40 includes at least the following members:
41 size_t gl_pathc; /* count of paths matched by */
43 /* pattern */
44 char **gl_pathv; /* pointer to list of matched */
45 /* path names */
46 size_t gl_offs; /* slots to reserve at beginning */
47 /* of gl_pathv */
48 The glob() function stores the number of matched path names into
52 pglob−>gl_pathc and a pointer to a list of pointers to path names into
53 pglob−>gl_pathv. The path names are in sort order as defined by the
54 current setting of the LC_COLLATE category. The first pointer after
55 the last path name is a NULL pointer. If the pattern does not match any
56 path names, the returned number of matched paths is set to 0, and the
57 contents of pglob−>gl_pathv are implementation-dependent.
58 It is the caller's responsibility to create the structure pointed to by
61 pglob. The glob() function allocates other space as needed, including
62 the memory pointed to by gl_pathv. The globfree() function frees any
63 space associated with pglob from a previous call to glob().
64 flags Argument
66 The flags argument is used to control the behavior of glob(). The value
67 of flags is a bitwise inclusive OR of zero or more of the following
68 constants, which are defined in the header <glob.h>:
69 GLOB_APPEND Append path names generated to the ones from a previ‐
71 ous call to glob().
72 GLOB_DOOFFS Make use of pglob−>gl_offs. If this flag is set,
75 pglob−>gl_offs is used to specify how many NULL point‐
76 ers to add to the beginning of pglob−>gl_pathv. In
77 other words, pglob−>gl_pathv will point to
78 pglob−>gl_offs NULL pointers, followed by
79 pglob−>gl_pathc path name pointers, followed by a NULL
80 pointer.
81 GLOB_ERR Causes glob() to return when it encounters a directory
84 that it cannot open or read. Ordinarily, glob() con‐
85 tinues to find matches.
86 GLOB_MARK Each path name that is a directory that matches pat‐
89 tern has a slash appended.
90 GLOB_NOCHECK If pattern does not match any path name, then glob()
93 returns a list consisting of only pattern, and the
94 number of matched path names is 1.
95 GLOB_NOESCAPE Disable backslash escaping.
98 GLOB_NOSORT Ordinarily, glob() sorts the matching path names
101 according to the current setting of the LC_COLLATE
102 category. When this flag is used the order of path
103 names returned is unspecified.
104 The GLOB_APPEND flag can be used to append a new set of path names to
108 those found in a previous call to glob(). The following rules apply
109 when two or more calls to glob() are made with the same value of pglob
110 and without intervening calls to globfree():
111 1. The first such call must not set GLOB_APPEND. All subsequent
113 calls must set it.
114 2. All the calls must set GLOB_DOOFFS, or all must not set it.
116 3. After the second call, pglob−>gl_pathv points to a list con‐
118 taining the following:
119 a. Zero or more NULL pointers, as specified by GLOB_DOOFFS
121 and pglob−>gl_offs.
122 b. Pointers to the path names that were in the
124 pglob−>gl_pathv list before the call, in the same order
125 as before.
126 c. Pointers to the new path names generated by the second
128 call, in the specified order.
129 4. The count returned in pglob−>gl_pathc will be the total num‐
131 ber of path names from the two calls.
132 5. The application can change any of the fields after a call to
134 glob(). If it does, it must reset them to the original value
135 before a subsequent call, using the same pglob value, to
136 globfree() or glob() with the GLOB_APPEND flag.
137 errfunc and epath Arguments
139 If, during the search, a directory is encountered that cannot be opened
140 or read and errfunc is not a NULL pointer, glob() calls (*errfunc) with
141 two arguments:
142 1. The epath argument is a pointer to the path that failed.
144 2. The eerrno argument is the value of errno from the failure,
146 as set by the opendir(3C), readdir(3C) or stat(2) functions.
147 (Other values may be used to report other errors not explic‐
148 itly documented for those functions.)
149 The following constants are defined as error return values for glob():
152 GLOB_ABORTED The scan was stopped because GLOB_ERR was set or
154 (*errfunc) returned non-zero.
155 GLOB_NOMATCH The pattern does not match any existing path name, and
158 GLOB_NOCHECK was not set in flags.
159 GLOG_NOSPACE An attempt to allocate memory failed.
162 If (*errfunc) is called and returns non-zero, or if the GLOB_ERR flag
166 is set in flags, glob() stops the scan and returns GLOB_ABORTED after
167 setting gl_pathc and gl_pathv in pglob to reflect the paths already
168 scanned. If GLOB_ERR is not set and either errfunc is a NULL pointer or
169 (*errfunc) returns 0, the error is ignored.
170
172 The following values are returned by glob():
173 0 Successful completion. The argument pglob−>gl_pathc returns
175 the number of matched path names and the argument
176 pglob−>gl_pathv contains a pointer to a null-terminated
177 list of matched and sorted path names. However, if
178 pglob−>gl_pathc is 0, the content of pglob−>gl_pathv is
179 undefined.
180 non-zero An error has occurred. Non-zero constants are defined in
183 <glob.h>. The arguments pglob−>gl_pathc and pglob−>gl_pathv
184 are still set as defined above.
185 The globfree() function returns no value.
189
191 This function is not provided for the purpose of enabling utilities to
192 perform path name expansion on their arguments, as this operation is
193 performed by the shell, and utilities are explicitly not expected to
194 redo this. Instead, it is provided for applications that need to do
195 path name expansion on strings obtained from other sources, such as a
196 pattern typed by a user or read from a file.
197 If a utility needs to see if a path name matches a given pattern, it
200 can use fnmatch(3C).
201 Note that gl_pathc and gl_pathv have meaning even if glob() fails. This
204 allows glob() to report partial results in the event of an error. How‐
205 ever, if gl_pathc is 0, gl_pathv is unspecified even if glob() did not
206 return an error.
207 The GLOB_NOCHECK option could be used when an application wants to
210 expand a path name if wildcards are specified, but wants to treat the
211 pattern as just a string otherwise.
212 The new path names generated by a subsequent call with GLOB_APPEND are
215 not sorted together with the previous path names. This mirrors the way
216 that the shell handles path name expansion when multiple expansions are
217 done on a command line.
218 Applications that need tilde and parameter expansion should use the
221 wordexp(3C) function.
222
224 Example 1 Example of glob_doofs function.
225 One use of the GLOB_DOOFFS flag is by applications that build an argu‐
228 ment list for use with the execv(), execve(), or execvp() functions
229 (see exec(2)). Suppose, for example, that an application wants to do
230 the equivalent of:
231 ls -l *.c
234 but for some reason:
238 system("ls -l *.c")
241 is not acceptable. The application could obtain approximately the same
245 result using the sequence:
246 globbuf.gl_offs = 2;
249 glob ("*.c", GLOB_DOOFFS, NULL, &globbuf);
250 globbuf.gl_pathv[0] = "ls";
251 globbuf.gl_pathv[1] = "-l";
252 execvp ("ls", &globbuf.gl_pathv[0]);
253 Using the same example:
257 ls -l *.c *.h
260 could be approximately simulated using GLOB_APPEND as follows:
264 globbuf.gl_offs = 2;
267 glob ("*.c", GLOB_DOOFFS, NULL, &globbuf);
268 glob ("*.h", GLOB_DOOFFS|GLOB_APPEND, NULL, &globbuf);
269 ...
270
273 See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:
274 ┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
279 │ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
280 ├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
281 │Interface Stability │Standard │
282 ├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
283 │MT-Level │MT-Safe │
284 └─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
285
287 execv(2), stat(2), fnmatch(3C), opendir(3C), readdir(3C), wordexp(3C),
288 attributes(5), standards(5)
289SunOS 5.11 1 Nov 2003 glob(3C)