Cross-Platform API to monitor file system in C?

Question

I'm looking for a cross platform library to detect when files in a directory are added or modified.
I know there are OS specific way to do this (inotify for Linux, FindFirstChangeNotification for windows, etc...).

But is there a platform independent library that works specifically in C? (Like the QFileSystemWatcher in C++)

Larpon · Answer 1 · 2021-03-22T16:12:01.493

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It's now 2021 so maybe septag/dmon is your cup of tea.

From the description:

Single header C99 portable library for monitoring directory changes

... or maybe the more beefy fswatch ?

edited Mar 22 '21 at 16:12

answered Mar 22 '21 at 14:08

Larpon

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score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 06 '16 at 08:53

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inotify is Linux specific, if you want some UNIX portable features you are pobably looking for something like libfam. it is name of library. Full package name is fileschanged.

fileschanged is a GNU/Linux command-line utility that reports when files have been altered.

answered Dec 06 '16 at 08:53

Sumit Gemini

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Cool! I didn't know that library. But what I'm searching specifically is, something that will work for Windows and for Linux – cydan Dec 06 '16 at 09:02
The APIs are totally different for Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, and any other Unix you can name, it seems. I don't know of any cross-platform library that handles this in a consistent way. – Sumit Gemini Dec 06 '16 at 09:06

score -6 · Answer 3 · answered May 01 '17 at 16:41

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Sounds like a good use case for golang. Simply change $GOOS and/or $GOARCH and run go build.

Boom - trivial cross-platform development.

answered May 01 '17 at 16:41

Homer Simpson

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The question asks about C, not GO. – john01dav Oct 15 '17 at 19:26
And if using C is an arbitrarily self-imposed constraint, Go is a reasonable consideration. – Homer Simpson Oct 18 '17 at 15:13

Cross-Platform API to monitor file system in C?

3 Answers3