How to get the current directory in a C program?

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I'm making a C program where I need to get the directory that the program is started from. This program is written for UNIX computers. I've been looking at opendir() and telldir(), but telldir() returns a off_t (long int), so it really doesn't help me.

How can I get the current path in a string (char array)?

working-directory unix c
7 Answers

Have you had a look at getcwd()?

#include <unistd.h>
char *getcwd(char *buf, size_t size);

Simple example:

#include <unistd.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <limits.h>

int main() {
   char cwd[PATH_MAX];
   if (getcwd(cwd, sizeof(cwd)) != NULL) {
       printf("Current working dir: %s\n", cwd);
   } else {
       perror("getcwd() error");
       return 1;
   }
   return 0;
}
user_356560

Look up the man page for getcwd.

CAdaker_305790

To get current directory (where you execute your target program), you can use the following example code, which works for both Visual Studio and Linux/MacOS(gcc/clang), both C and C++:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>

#if defined(_MSC_VER)
#include <direct.h>
#define getcwd _getcwd
#elif defined(__GNUC__)
#include <unistd.h>
#endif

int main() {
    char* buffer;

    if( (buffer=getcwd(NULL, 0)) == NULL) {
        perror("failed to get current directory\n");
    } else {
        printf("%s \nLength: %zu\n", buffer, strlen(buffer));
        free(buffer);
    }

    return 0;
}
user_29990960

Note that getcwd(3) is also available in Microsoft's libc: getcwd(3), and works the same way you'd expect.

Must link with -loldnames (oldnames.lib, which is done automatically in most cases), or use _getcwd(). The unprefixed version is unavailable under Windows RT.

user_73854310

Use getcwd

#include <stdio.h>  /* defines FILENAME_MAX */
//#define WINDOWS  /* uncomment this line to use it for windows.*/
#ifdef WINDOWS
#include <direct.h>
#define GetCurrentDir _getcwd
#else
#include <unistd.h>
#define GetCurrentDir getcwd
#endif

int main(){
  char buff[FILENAME_MAX];
  GetCurrentDir( buff, FILENAME_MAX );
  printf("Current working dir: %s\n", buff);
  return 1;
}

OR

#include<stdio.h>
#include<unistd.h> 
#include<stdlib.h>

main() {
char *buf;
buf=(char *)malloc(100*sizeof(char));
getcwd(buf,100);
printf("\n %s \n",buf);
}
user_148737340
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