Pipes, dup2 and exec()

Question

I have to write a shell that can run pipes. For example commands like ls -l | wc -l". I have successfully parsed the command given by the user as below:

"ls" = firstcmd

"-l" = frsarg

"wc" = scmd

"-l" = secarg

Now I have to use two forks since the commands are two and a pipe. The code block that I wrote to exec the command is the following:

pid_t pid;
int fd[2];

pipe(fd);
pid = fork();

if(pid==0)
{        
    dup2(fd[WRITE_END], STDOUT_FILENO);
    close(fd[READ_END]);
    execlp(firstcmd, firstcmd, frsarg, (char*) NULL);
}
else
{ 
    pid=fork();

    if(pid==0)
    {
        dup2(fd[READ_END], STDIN_FILENO);
        close(fd[WRITE_END]);
        execlp(scmd, scmd, secarg, (char*) NULL);
    }
}

So when I run my shell and I enter the command ls -l | wc -l (for example) the result from the execs doesn't show up but the shell keeps running normally.

The strange thing is that the result of the command shows only when I terminate my shell with "exit" or "^C".

What is wrong with that output? Why doesn't it show up right after I enter the command?

Answer 1

You need to close all the pipe descriptors in both the parent process and the child process (after duplication in the child process). In your code the main issue is that, the wc process does not exit because there are still writers present (since the parent process has not closed the write end). Changes shown below. I have also added the waitpid in the parent process to wait for the wc process.

pid_t pid;
int fd[2];

pipe(fd);
pid = fork();

if(pid==0)
{
    dup2(fd[WRITE_END], STDOUT_FILENO);
    close(fd[READ_END]);
    close(fd[WRITE_END]);
    execlp(firstcmd, firstcmd, frsarg, (char*) NULL);
    fprintf(stderr, "Failed to execute '%s'\n", firstcmd);
    exit(1);
}
else
{ 
    pid=fork();

    if(pid==0)
    {
        dup2(fd[READ_END], STDIN_FILENO);
        close(fd[WRITE_END]);
        close(fd[READ_END]);
        execlp(scmd, scmd, secarg,(char*) NULL);
        fprintf(stderr, "Failed to execute '%s'\n", scmd);
        exit(1);
    }
    else
    {
        int status;
        close(fd[READ_END]);
        close(fd[WRITE_END]);
        waitpid(pid, &status, 0);
    }
}

Answer 2

Hmm, close enough. You miss to handle close on some file descriptor after fork.

Here is some reference:

1. About pipe, http://unixwiz.net/techtips/remap-pipe-fds.html
2. About file descriptor, http://www.usna.edu/Users/cs/aviv/classes/ic221/s14/lec/09/lec.html

Here's my code:

#include  <fcntl.h>                              //
#include  <stdio.h>                              //
#include  <stdlib.h>                             //
#include  <string.h>                             //
#include  <sys/types.h>                          //
#include  <sys/wait.h>                           //
#include  <sys/stat.h>                           //
#include  <termios.h>                            //
#include  <unistd.h>                             //
                                                 //
#define INPUT_END 1                              // INPUT_END means where the pipe takes input
#define OUTPUT_END 0                             // OUTPUT_END means where the pipe produces output
                                                 //
int main(int argc, char* argv[])                 //
{                                                //
    pid_t pid1;                                  // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> terminal_output]                       (of the parent process)
    pid_t pid2;                                  //
    int fd[2];                                   //
                                                 //
    pipe(fd);                                    // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> terminal_output, fd[0] -> pipe_input, fd[1] -> pipe_output]
    pid1 = fork();                               //
                                                 //
    if(pid1==0)                                  //
    {                                            // I am going to be the wc process (i.e. taking input from the pipe)
        close(fd[INPUT_END]);                    // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> terminal_output, fd[1] -> pipe_output] (of the WC process)
        dup2(fd[OUTPUT_END], STDIN_FILENO);      // [STDIN -> pipe_output, STDOUT -> terminal_output, fd[1] -> pipe_output]    (of the WC process)
        close(fd[OUTPUT_END]);                   // [STDIN -> pipe_output, STDOUT -> terminal_output]                          (of the WC process)
        execlp("wc", "wc", "-l",(char*) NULL);   //
    }                                            //
    else                                         //
    {                                            //
        pid2=fork();                             //
                                                 //
        if(pid2==0)                              //
        {                                        // I am going to be the ls process (i.e. producing output to the pipe)
            close(fd[OUTPUT_END]);               // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> terminal_output, fd[0] -> pipe_input] (of the ls process)
            dup2(fd[INPUT_END], STDOUT_FILENO);  // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> pipe_input, fd[0] -> pipe_input]      (of the ls process)
            close(fd[INPUT_END]);                // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> pipe_input]                           (of the ls process)
            execlp("ls","ls","-l",(char*) NULL); //
        }                                        //
                                                 //
        close(fd[OUTPUT_END]);                   // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> terminal_output, fd[0] -> pipe_input] (of the parent process)
        close(fd[INPUT_END]);                    // [STDIN -> terminal_input, STDOUT -> terminal_output]                      (of the parent process)
        waitpid(-1, NULL, 0);                    // As the parent process - we wait for a process to die (-1) means I don't care which one - it could be either ls or wc
        waitpid(-1, NULL, 0);                    // As the parent process - we wait for the another process to die.
                                                 // At this point we can safely assume both process are completed
    }                                            //
}                                                //

Answer 3

Well, a simple and efficient work arund for something like this is making a script with the pipe stuff and then calling the script with some exec command from your C code.

script.sh

#!/bin/sh
ls -l | wc -l

And the you just do in your C program something like this

char *argv[] = {"script.sh", NULL};
execv(argv[0], argv);

Note that you'll have to have the script.sh in the same directory of your C program.