Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help@sourceware.cygnus.com; run by ezmlm List-Subscribe: List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: , Sender: cygwin-owner@sources.redhat.com Delivered-To: mailing list cygwin@sources.redhat.com Message-ID: <398FD5CC.38E3715C@ision.net> Date: Tue, 08 Aug 2000 11:41:32 +0200 From: Benjamin Riefenstahl Organization: ISION Internet AG X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 [en] (Win16; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: cygwin@sourceware.cygnus.com Subject: Re: System call References: <200008071421.KAA02793@envy.delorie.com> <20000807161543.G12330@cygnus.com> <398F32A3.12530BE4@veritas.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Bob, Bob McGowan wrote: > /* `dir', `vdir' and `ls' directory listing programs for GNU. > Copyright (C) 85, 88, 90, 91, 95, 1996 Free Software Foundation, Inc. > [...] > Perhaps this is the source of some of the confusion? Part of it probably. Another is the definition of the system() function most likely. It's supposed to call the system shell for processing of it's argument. Now for Cygwin this would be "/bin/sh -c", naturally. For VC++, Borland, Metrowerks or any other straight Windows compiler the system shell should be "%COMSPEC% /c". So for any newby coming from a Windows background and trying Cygwin, it's kind of mysterious at first, why system("dir") works in VC++, and not in Cygwin. Basically, the system() functions is highly specific to the compiler and environment. This goes so far that some Macintosh compilers implement it with a simple "return NULL;", with the reasoning that there *is* no shell on MacOS to call. so long, benny -- ISION Internet AG Benjamin Riefenstahl mailto:benjamin.riefenstahl@ision.net Ruhrstrasse 61 D-22761 Hamburg http://www.ision.net -- Want to unsubscribe from this list? Send a message to cygwin-unsubscribe@sourceware.cygnus.com