wordexp(3p) — Linux manual page

PROLOG | NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | RETURN VALUE | ERRORS | EXAMPLES | APPLICATION USAGE | RATIONALE | FUTURE DIRECTIONS | SEE ALSO | COPYRIGHT

WORDEXP(3P)             POSIX Programmer's Manual            WORDEXP(3P)

PROLOG         top

       This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The
       Linux implementation of this interface may differ (consult the
       corresponding Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior),
       or the interface may not be implemented on Linux.

NAME         top

       wordexp, wordfree — perform word expansions

SYNOPSIS         top

       #include <wordexp.h>

       int wordexp(const char *restrict words, wordexp_t *restrict pwordexp,
           int flags);
       void wordfree(wordexp_t *pwordexp);

DESCRIPTION         top

       The wordexp() function shall perform word expansions as described
       in the Shell and Utilities volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section 2.6,
       Word Expansions, subject to quoting as described in the Shell and
       Utilities volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section 2.2, Quoting, and place
       the list of expanded words into the structure pointed to by
       pwordexp.

       The words argument is a pointer to a string containing one or
       more words to be expanded. The expansions shall be the same as
       would be performed by the command line interpreter if words were
       the part of a command line representing the arguments to a
       utility. Therefore, the application shall ensure that words does
       not contain an unquoted <newline> character or any of the
       unquoted shell special characters '|', '&', ';', '<', '>' except
       in the context of command substitution as specified in the Shell
       and Utilities volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section 2.6.3, Command
       Substitution.  It also shall not contain unquoted parentheses or
       braces, except in the context of command or variable
       substitution. The application shall ensure that every member of
       words which it expects to have expanded by wordexp() does not
       contain an unquoted initial comment character. The application
       shall also ensure that any words which it intends to be ignored
       (because they begin or continue a comment) are deleted from
       words.  If the argument words contains an unquoted comment
       character (<number-sign>) that is the beginning of a token,
       wordexp() shall either treat the comment character as a regular
       character, or interpret it as a comment indicator and ignore the
       remainder of words.

       The structure type wordexp_t is defined in the <wordexp.h> header
       and includes at least the following members:
     ┌───────────────┬──────────────┬────────────────────────────────────┐
     │ Member Type   Member Name  Description             │
     ├───────────────┼──────────────┼────────────────────────────────────┤
     │ size_t        we_wordc      │ Count of words matched by words.   │
     │ char **       we_wordv      │ Pointer to list of expanded words. │
     │ size_t        we_offs       │ Slots to reserve at the beginning  │
     │               │              │ of pwordexp->we_wordv.             │
     └───────────────┴──────────────┴────────────────────────────────────┘

       The wordexp() function shall store the number of generated words
       into pwordexp->we_wordc and a pointer to a list of pointers to
       words in pwordexp->we_wordv. Each individual field created during
       field splitting (see the Shell and Utilities volume of
       POSIX.1‐2017, Section 2.6.5, Field Splitting) or pathname
       expansion (see the Shell and Utilities volume of POSIX.1‐2017,
       Section 2.6.6, Pathname Expansion) shall be a separate word in
       the pwordexp->we_wordv list. The words shall be in order as
       described in the Shell and Utilities volume of POSIX.1‐2017,
       Section 2.6, Word Expansions.  The first pointer after the last
       word pointer shall be a null pointer.  The expansion of special
       parameters described in the Shell and Utilities volume of
       POSIX.1‐2017, Section 2.5.2, Special Parameters is unspecified.

       It is the caller's responsibility to allocate the storage pointed
       to by pwordexp.  The wordexp() function shall allocate other
       space as needed, including memory pointed to by
       pwordexp->we_wordv. The wordfree() function frees any memory
       associated with pwordexp from a previous call to wordexp().

       The flags argument is used to control the behavior of wordexp().
       The value of flags is the bitwise-inclusive OR of zero or more of
       the following constants, which are defined in <wordexp.h>:

       WRDE_APPEND   Append words generated to the ones from a previous
                     call to wordexp().

       WRDE_DOOFFS   Make use of pwordexp->we_offs. If this flag is set,
                     pwordexp->we_offs is used to specify how many null
                     pointers to add to the beginning of
                     pwordexp->we_wordv.  In other words,
                     pwordexp->we_wordv shall point to pwordexp->we_offs
                     null pointers, followed by pwordexp->we_wordc word
                     pointers, followed by a null pointer.

       WRDE_NOCMD    If the implementation supports the utilities
                     defined in the Shell and Utilities volume of
                     POSIX.1‐2017, fail if command substitution, as
                     specified in the Shell and Utilities volume of
                     POSIX.1‐2017, Section 2.6.3, Command Substitution,
                     is requested.

       WRDE_REUSE    The pwordexp argument was passed to a previous
                     successful call to wordexp(), and has not been
                     passed to wordfree().  The result shall be the same
                     as if the application had called wordfree() and
                     then called wordexp() without WRDE_REUSE.

       WRDE_SHOWERR  Do not redirect stderr to /dev/null.

       WRDE_UNDEF    Report error on an attempt to expand an undefined
                     shell variable.

       The WRDE_APPEND flag can be used to append a new set of words to
       those generated by a previous call to wordexp().  The following
       rules apply to applications when two or more calls to wordexp()
       are made with the same value of pwordexp and without intervening
       calls to wordfree():

        1. The first such call shall not set WRDE_APPEND. All subsequent
           calls shall set it.

        2. All of the calls shall set WRDE_DOOFFS, or all shall not set
           it.

        3. After the second and each subsequent call, pwordexp->we_wordv
           shall point to a list containing the following:

            a. Zero or more null pointers, as specified by WRDE_DOOFFS
               and pwordexp->we_offs

            b. Pointers to the words that were in the pwordexp->we_wordv
               list before the call, in the same order as before

            c. Pointers to the new words generated by the latest call,
               in the specified order

        4. The count returned in pwordexp->we_wordc shall be the total
           number of words from all of the calls.

        5. The application can change any of the fields after a call to
           wordexp(), but if it does it shall reset them to the original
           value before a subsequent call, using the same pwordexp
           value, to wordfree() or wordexp() with the WRDE_APPEND or
           WRDE_REUSE flag.

       If the implementation supports the utilities defined in the Shell
       and Utilities volume of POSIX.1‐2017, and words contains an
       unquoted character—<newline>, '|', '&', ';', '<', '>', '(', ')',
       '{', '}'—in an inappropriate context, wordexp() shall fail, and
       the number of expanded words shall be 0.

       Unless WRDE_SHOWERR is set in flags, wordexp() shall redirect
       stderr to /dev/null for any utilities executed as a result of
       command substitution while expanding words.  If WRDE_SHOWERR is
       set, wordexp() may write messages to stderr if syntax errors are
       detected while expanding words, unless the stderr stream has wide
       orientation in which case the behavior is undefined.  It is
       unspecified whether any write errors encountered while outputting
       such messages will affect the stderr error indicator or the value
       of errno.

       The application shall ensure that if WRDE_DOOFFS is set, then
       pwordexp->we_offs has the same value for each wordexp() call and
       wordfree() call using a given pwordexp.

       The results are unspecified if WRDE_APPEND and WRDE_REUSE are
       both specified.

       The following constants are defined as error return values:

       WRDE_BADCHAR  One of the unquoted characters—<newline>, '|', '&',
                     ';', '<', '>', '(', ')', '{', '}'—appears in words
                     in an inappropriate context.

       WRDE_BADVAL   Reference to undefined shell variable when
                     WRDE_UNDEF is set in flags.

       WRDE_CMDSUB   Command substitution requested when WRDE_NOCMD was
                     set in flags.

       WRDE_NOSPACE  Attempt to allocate memory failed.

       WRDE_SYNTAX   Shell syntax error, such as unbalanced parentheses
                     or unterminated string.

RETURN VALUE         top

       Upon successful completion, wordexp() shall return 0. Otherwise,
       a non-zero value, as described in <wordexp.h>, shall be returned
       to indicate an error. If wordexp() returns the value
       WRDE_NOSPACE, then pwordexp->we_wordc and pwordexp->we_wordv
       shall be updated to reflect any words that were successfully
       expanded. In other error cases, if the WRDE_APPEND flag was
       specified, pwordexp->we_wordc and pwordexp->we_wordv shall not be
       modified.

       The wordfree() function shall not return a value.

ERRORS         top

       No errors are defined.

       The following sections are informative.

EXAMPLES         top

       None.

APPLICATION USAGE         top

       The wordexp() function is intended to be used by an application
       that wants to do all of the shell's expansions on a word or words
       obtained from a user. For example, if the application prompts for
       a pathname (or list of pathnames) and then uses wordexp() to
       process the input, the user could respond with anything that
       would be valid as input to the shell.

       The WRDE_NOCMD flag is provided for applications that, for
       security or other reasons, want to prevent a user from executing
       shell commands.  Disallowing unquoted shell special characters
       also prevents unwanted side-effects, such as executing a command
       or writing a file.

       POSIX.1‐2008 does not require the wordexp() function to be
       thread-safe if passed an expression referencing an environment
       variable while any other thread is concurrently modifying any
       environment variable; see exec(1p).

       Even though the WRDE_SHOWERR flag allows the implementation to
       write messages to stderr during command substitution or syntax
       errors, this standard does not provide any way to detect write
       failures during the output of such messages.

       Applications which use wide-character output functions with
       stderr should ensure that any calls to wordexp() do not write to
       stderr, by avoiding use of the WRDE_SHOWERR flag.

RATIONALE         top

       This function was included as an alternative to glob().  There
       had been continuing controversy over exactly what features should
       be included in glob().  It is hoped that by providing wordexp()
       (which provides all of the shell word expansions, but which may
       be slow to execute) and glob() (which is faster, but which only
       performs pathname expansion, without tilde or parameter
       expansion) this will satisfy the majority of applications.

       While wordexp() could be implemented entirely as a library
       routine, it is expected that most implementations run a shell in
       a subprocess to do the expansion.

       Two different approaches have been proposed for how the required
       information might be presented to the shell and the results
       returned.  They are presented here as examples.

       One proposal is to extend the echo utility by adding a -q option.
       This option would cause echo to add a <backslash> before each
       <backslash> and <blank> that occurs within an argument. The
       wordexp() function could then invoke the shell as follows:

           (void) strcpy(buffer, "echo -q");
           (void) strcat(buffer, words);
           if ((flags & WRDE_SHOWERR) == 0)
               (void) strcat(buffer, "2>/dev/null");
           f = popen(buffer, "r");

       The wordexp() function would read the resulting output, remove
       unquoted <backslash> characters, and break into words at unquoted
       <blank> characters. If the WRDE_NOCMD flag was set, wordexp()
       would have to scan words before starting the subshell to make
       sure that there would be no command substitution. In any case, it
       would have to scan words for unquoted special characters.

       Another proposal is to add the following options to sh:

       -w wordlist
             This option provides a wordlist expansion service to
             applications. The words in wordlist shall be expanded and
             the following written to standard output:

              1. The count of the number of words after expansion, in
                 decimal, followed by a null byte

              2. The number of bytes needed to represent the expanded
                 words (not including null separators), in decimal,
                 followed by a null byte

              3. The expanded words, each terminated by a null byte

             If an error is encountered during word expansion, sh exits
             with a non-zero status after writing the former to report
             any words successfully expanded

       -P    Run in ``protected'' mode. If specified with the -w option,
             no command substitution shall be performed.

       With these options, wordexp() could be implemented fairly simply
       by creating a subprocess using fork() and executing sh using the
       line:

           execl(<shell path>, "sh", "-P", "-w", words, (char *)0);

       after directing standard error to /dev/null.

       It seemed objectionable for a library routine to write messages
       to standard error, unless explicitly requested, so wordexp() is
       required to redirect standard error to /dev/null to ensure that
       no messages are generated, even for commands executed for command
       substitution. The WRDE_SHOWERR flag can be specified to request
       that error messages be written.

       The WRDE_REUSE flag allows the implementation to avoid the
       expense of freeing and reallocating memory, if that is possible.
       A minimal implementation can call wordfree() when WRDE_REUSE is
       set.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS         top

       None.

SEE ALSO         top

       exec(1p), fnmatch(3p), glob(3p)

       The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, wordexp.h(0p)

       The Shell and Utilities volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Chapter 2, Shell
       Command Language

COPYRIGHT         top

       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic
       form from IEEE Std 1003.1-2017, Standard for Information
       Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The
       Open Group Base Specifications Issue 7, 2018 Edition, Copyright
       (C) 2018 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics
       Engineers, Inc and The Open Group.  In the event of any
       discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and The
       Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group
       Standard is the referee document. The original Standard can be
       obtained online at http:https://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .

       Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page
       are most likely to have been introduced during the conversion of
       the source files to man page format. To report such errors, see
       https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .

IEEE/The Open Group               2017                       WORDEXP(3P)