NAME
dirname —
extract the directory part of a
pathname
LIBRARY
library “libc”
SYNOPSIS
#include
<libgen.h>
char *
dirname(char
*path);
DESCRIPTION
Thedirname()
function is the converse of
basename(3); it returns a pointer to the parent directory of the
pathname pointed to by path. Any trailing
‘/’ characters are not counted as part of the directory name. If
path is a null pointer, the empty string, or contains no
‘/’ characters, dirname() returns a
pointer to the string ".", signifying the current directory.
RETURN VALUES
On successful completion, dirname()
returns a pointer to the parent directory of path.
If dirname() fails, a null pointer is
returned and the global variable errno is set to
indicate the error.
ERRORS
The following error codes may be set in errno:
- [
ENAMETOOLONG] - The path component to be returned was larger than
MAXPATHLEN.
WARNINGS
Other vendor implementations of
dirname()
may modify the contents of the string passed to
dirname(); this should be taken into account when
writing code which calls this function if portability is desired.
SEE ALSO
STANDARDS
The dirname() function conforms to
X/Open Portability Guide Issue 4, Version 2
(“XPG4.2”).
HISTORY
The dirname() function first appeared in
OpenBSD 2.2 and FreeBSD
4.2.
AUTHORS
Todd C. Miller <Todd.Miller@courtesan.com>