I've created a question about this a few days. My solution is something in the lines of what was suggested in the accepted answer. However, a friend of mine came up with the following solution:
Please note that the code has been updated a few times (check the edit revisions) to reflect the suggestions in the answers below. If you intend to give a new answer, please do so with this new code in mind and not the old one which had lots of problems.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <unistd.h>
int main(int argc, char *argv[]){
int fd[2], i, aux, std0, std1;
do {
std0 = dup(0); // backup stdin
std1 = dup(1); // backup stdout
// let's pretend I'm reading commands here in a shell prompt
READ_COMMAND_FROM_PROMPT();
for(i=1; i<argc; i++) {
// do we have a previous command?
if(i > 1) {
dup2(aux, 0);
close(aux);
}
// do we have a next command?
if(i < argc-1) {
pipe(fd);
aux = fd[0];
dup2(fd[1], 1);
close(fd[1]);
}
// last command? restore stdout...
if(i == argc-1) {
dup2(std1, 1);
close(std1);
}
if(!fork()) {
// if not last command, close all pipe ends
// (the child doesn't use them)
if(i < argc-1) {
close(std0);
close(std1);
close(fd[0]);
}
execlp(argv[i], argv[i], NULL);
exit(0);
}
}
// restore stdin to be able to keep using the shell
dup2(std0, 0);
close(std0);
}
return 0;
}
This simulates a series of commands through pipes like in bash, for instance: cmd1 | cmd2 | ... | cmd_n. I say "simulate", because, as you can see, the commands are actually read from the arguments. Just to spare time coding a simple shell prompt...
Of course there are some issues to fix and to add like error handling but that's not the point here. I think I kinda get the code but it still makes me a lot of confusing how this whole thing works.
Am I missing something or this really works and it's a nice and clean solution to solve the problem? If not, can anyone point me the crucial problems this code has?