getopt does not parse optional arguments to parameters
CArgumentsGetoptGetopt LongOptional ArgumentsC Problem Overview
In C, getopt_long does not parse the optional arguments to command line parameters parameters.
When I run the program, the optional argument is not recognized like the example run below.
$ ./respond --praise John
Kudos to John
$ ./respond --blame John
You suck !
$ ./respond --blame
You suck !
Here is the test code.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <getopt.h>
int main(int argc, char ** argv )
{
int getopt_ret, option_index;
static struct option long_options[] = {
{"praise", required_argument, 0, 'p'},
{"blame", optional_argument, 0, 'b'},
{0, 0, 0, 0} };
while (1) {
getopt_ret = getopt_long( argc, argv, "p:b::",
long_options, &option_index);
if (getopt_ret == -1) break;
switch(getopt_ret)
{
case 0: break;
case 'p':
printf("Kudos to %s\n", optarg); break;
case 'b':
printf("You suck ");
if (optarg)
printf (", %s!\n", optarg);
else
printf ("!\n", optarg);
break;
case '?':
printf("Unknown option\n"); break;
}
}
return 0;
}
C Solutions
Solution 1 - C
Although not mentioned in glibc documentation or getopt man page, optional arguments to long style command line parameters require 'equals sign' (=). Space separating the optional argument from the parameter does not work.
An example run with the test code:
> $ ./respond --praise John > Kudos to John > $ ./respond --praise=John > Kudos to John > $ ./respond --blame John > You suck ! > $ ./respond --blame=John > You suck , John!
Solution 2 - C
The man page certainly doesn't document it very well, but the source code helps a little.
Briefly: you're supposed to do something like the following (though this may be a little over-pedantic):
if( !optarg
&& optind < argc // make sure optind is valid
&& NULL != argv[optind] // make sure it's not a null string
&& '\0' != argv[optind][0] // ... or an empty string
&& '-' != argv[optind][0] // ... or another option
) {
// update optind so the next getopt_long invocation skips argv[optind]
my_optarg = argv[optind++];
}
/* ... */
> From among the comments preceding _getopt_internal:
>
> ...
>
> If getopt finds another option character, it returns that character,
> updating optind and nextchar so that the next call to getopt can
> resume the scan with the following option character or ARGV-element.
>
> If there are no more option characters, getopt returns -1.
> Then optind is the index in ARGV of the first ARGV-element
> that is not an option. (The ARGV-elements have been permuted
> so that those that are not options now come last.) <-- a note from me: > if the 3rd argument to getopt_long starts with a dash, argv will not > be permuted
>
> ...
>
> If a char in OPTSTRING is followed by a colon, that means it wants an arg,
> so the following text in the same ARGV-element, or the text of the following
> ARGV-element, is returned in optarg. Two colons mean an option that
> wants an optional arg; if there is text in the current ARGV-element,
> it is returned in optarg, otherwise optarg is set to zero.
>
> ...
... though you have to do some reading between the lines. The following does what you want:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <getopt.h>
int main(int argc, char* argv[] ) {
int getopt_ret;
int option_index;
static struct option long_options[] = {
{"praise", required_argument, 0, 'p'}
, {"blame", optional_argument, 0, 'b'}
, {0, 0, 0, 0}
};
while( -1 != ( getopt_ret = getopt_long( argc
, argv
, "p:b::"
, long_options
, &option_index) ) ) {
const char *tmp_optarg = optarg;
switch( getopt_ret ) {
case 0: break;
case 1:
// handle non-option arguments here if you put a `-`
// at the beginning of getopt_long's 3rd argument
break;
case 'p':
printf("Kudos to %s\n", optarg); break;
case 'b':
if( !optarg
&& NULL != argv[optind]
&& '-' != argv[optind][0] ) {
// This is what makes it work; if `optarg` isn't set
// and argv[optind] doesn't look like another option,
// then assume it's our parameter and overtly modify optind
// to compensate.
//
// I'm not terribly fond of how this is done in the getopt
// API, but if you look at the man page it documents the
// existence of `optarg`, `optind`, etc, and they're
// not marked const -- implying they expect and intend you
// to modify them if needed.
tmp_optarg = argv[optind++];
}
printf( "You suck" );
if (tmp_optarg) {
printf (", %s!\n", tmp_optarg);
} else {
printf ("!\n");
}
break;
case '?':
printf("Unknown option\n");
break;
default:
printf( "Unknown: getopt_ret == %d\n", getopt_ret );
break;
}
}
return 0;
}
Solution 3 - C
I recently came across this issue myself. I arrived at a similar solution to the one Brian Vandenberg and Haystack suggested. But to improve readability and avoid code duplication, you can wrap it all up in a macro like below:
#define OPTIONAL_ARGUMENT_IS_PRESENT \
((optarg == NULL && optind < argc && argv[optind][0] != '-') \
? (bool) (optarg = argv[optind++]) \
: (optarg != NULL))
The macro can be used like this:
case 'o': // option with optional argument
if (OPTIONAL_ARGUMENT_IS_PRESENT)
{
// Handle is present
}
else
{
// Handle is not present
}
break;
If you are interested, you can read more about how this solution works in a blog post I wrote: https://cfengine.com/blog/2021/optional-arguments-with-getopt-long/
This solution is tested and is – at the time of this writing – currently used in CFEngine.
Solution 4 - C
I also ran into the same problem and came here. Then I realised this . You don't have much of a use case of "optional_argument" . If an option is required you check from program logic, if an option is optional then you need not do anything because at getopt level all options are optional , they are not mandatory, so there is no use case of "optional_argument". Hope this helps.
ps: for the above example i think the correct options are --praise --praise-name "name" --blame --blame-name "name"