Advanced Programming in the UNIX® Environment

ptg10805159

548 Interprocess Communication Chapter 15

if ((fpin = popen("myuclc", "r")) == NULL)

err_sys("popen error");

for ( ; ; ) {

fputs("prompt> ", stdout);

fflush(stdout);

if (fgets(line, MAXLINE, fpin) == NULL) /* read from pipe */

break;

if (fputs(line, stdout) == EOF)

err_sys("fputs error to pipe");

}

if (pclose(fpin) == -1)

err_sys("pclose error");

putchar(’\n’);

exit(0);

}

Figure 15.15 Invoke uppercase/lowercase filter to read commands

We need to callfflushafter writing the prompt, because the standardoutput is

normally line buffered, and the prompt does not contain a newline.

15.4 Coprocesses

AUNIX system filter is a program that reads from standardinput and writes to

standardoutput. Filters arenormally connected linearly in shell pipelines. Afilter

becomes acoprocesswhen the same program generates the filter’s input and reads the

filter ’s output.

The Korn shell provides coprocesses[Bolsky and Korn 1995].The Bourne shell, the

Bourne-again shell, and the C shell don’t provide a way to connect processes together as

coprocesses. A coprocess normally runs in the background from a shell, and its

standardinput and standardoutput areconnected to another program using a pipe.

Although the shell syntax required to initiate a coprocess and connect its input and

output to other processes is quite contorted (see pp. 62–63 of Bolsky and Korn[ 1995 ]for

all the details), coprocesses arealso useful from a C program.

Whereaspopengives us a one-way pipe to the standardinput or from the standard

output of another process, with a coprocess we have two one-way pipes to the other

process: one to its standardinput and one from its standardoutput. Wewant to write

to its standardinput, let it operate on the data, and then read from its standardoutput.

Example

Let’s look at coprocesses with an example. The process creates two pipes: one is the

standardinput of the coprocess and the other is the standardoutput of the coprocess.

Figure15.16 shows this arrangement.