Executing Command Line Strings From Ada95/GNAT

Executing Command Line Strings From Ada95/GNAT

[Marin David Condic, 561.796.8997, M/S 731-96]

    I seem to recall from DEC Ada83 that they provided a procedure (in
    Starlet?) which would take a string argument and execute it as if it
    were a DCL command. (Maybe this was wishful thinking - it's been a
    while since I've fooled with that particular compiler.)

    Anyway, I'd like to be able to do something very much like that
    using the GNAT compiler under Sun/Unix and/or PC/WinNT. Which is
    to say, I would like a procedure which will take a string argument
    and execute it as a C-Shell or MS-DOS command. I have not seen
    anything immediately obvious in the documentation - perhaps it
    involves building a binding to some system routine(s). (I'm not
    terribly familiar with the system calls for either OS at the
    moment - I *write* operating systems, not *use* them ;-)

    If someone knows of some method to do this or has any suggestions,
    I'd appreciate hearing from you. Thanks.

    MDC

Marin David Condic, Senior Computer Engineer     ATT:        561.796.8997
Pratt & Whitney GESP, M/S 731-96, P.O.B. 109600  Fax:        561.796.4669
West Palm Beach, FL, 33410-9600                  Internet:   CONDICMA@PWFL.COM
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Re: Executing Command Line Strings From Ada95/GNAT

[Stephen Leake]

Marin David Condic, 561.796.8997, M/S 731-96 wrote:
> 
>     ... I would like a procedure which will take a string argument
>     and execute it as a C-Shell or MS-DOS command. I have not seen
>     anything immediately obvious in the documentation - perhaps it
>     involves building a binding to some system routine(s). (I'm not
>     terribly familiar with the system calls for either OS at the
>     moment - I *write* operating systems, not *use* them ;-)
> 
>     If someone knows of some method to do this or has any suggestions,
>     I'd appreciate hearing from you. Thanks.

Yes, you have to use a system call.

In the Win32.hlp file, lookup ShellExecute; it seems to do what you
want, but as a Windows application, not an MS-DOS app. I haven't used
it, so I may be wrong. I think to run a real MS-DOS command, you can
call ShellExecute and specify the command string "COMMAND.COM /C
<command string>"; check the DOS help on COMMAND.COM for details.

The semi-standard C library way of doing this is the "system" function;
there may be one in the cygwin32 system, and there should be one under
Solaris.
> 
>     MDC
> 
-- 
- Stephe