getopt ¶Here is an example showing how getopt is typically used. The
key points to notice are:
getopt is called in a loop. When getopt returns
-1, indicating no more options are present, the loop terminates.
switch statement is used to dispatch on the return value from
getopt. In typical use, each case just sets a variable that
is used later in the program.
#include <ctype.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>
int
main (int argc, char **argv)
{
int aflag = 0;
int bflag = 0;
char *cvalue = NULL;
int index;
int c;
opterr = 0;
while ((c = getopt (argc, argv, "abc:")) != -1)
switch (c)
{
case 'a':
aflag = 1;
break;
case 'b':
bflag = 1;
break;
case 'c':
cvalue = optarg;
break;
case '?':
if (optopt == 'c')
fprintf (stderr, "Option -%c requires an argument.\n", optopt);
else if (isprint (optopt))
fprintf (stderr, "Unknown option `-%c'.\n", optopt);
else
fprintf (stderr,
"Unknown option character `\\x%x'.\n",
optopt);
return 1;
default:
abort ();
}
printf ("aflag = %d, bflag = %d, cvalue = %s\n",
aflag, bflag, cvalue);
for (index = optind; index < argc; index++)
printf ("Non-option argument %s\n", argv[index]);
return 0;
}
Here are some examples showing what this program prints with different combinations of arguments:
% testopt aflag = 0, bflag = 0, cvalue = (null) % testopt -a -b aflag = 1, bflag = 1, cvalue = (null) % testopt -ab aflag = 1, bflag = 1, cvalue = (null) % testopt -c foo aflag = 0, bflag = 0, cvalue = foo % testopt -cfoo aflag = 0, bflag = 0, cvalue = foo % testopt arg1 aflag = 0, bflag = 0, cvalue = (null) Non-option argument arg1 % testopt -a arg1 aflag = 1, bflag = 0, cvalue = (null) Non-option argument arg1 % testopt -c foo arg1 aflag = 0, bflag = 0, cvalue = foo Non-option argument arg1 % testopt -a -- -b aflag = 1, bflag = 0, cvalue = (null) Non-option argument -b % testopt -a - aflag = 1, bflag = 0, cvalue = (null) Non-option argument -