Extract base path from a pathname in C

Question

Question

How do you extract the base path from pathname in C?

Are there any functions built into the C language or the C-Runtime L

Answer 1

I think the best solution on Windows is to use _splitpath as was suggested, to use something like basename on Linux (more on that here).

That said, since someone has already suggested implementing my own (and since I had already done it while I was waiting for an answer), here is what I came up with. It is not cross-platform and it does not check for /valid/ paths or expand short or relative path names.

// Retrieves the pathpath from a pathname.
//
// Returns: SUCCESS if the basepath is present and successfully copied to the p_base_path buffer
//          FAILURE_NULL_ARGUMENT if any arguments are NULL
//          FAILURE_INVALID_ARGUMENTS if either buffer size is less than 1
//          FAILURE_BUFFER_TOO_SMALL if the p_basepath buffer is too small
//          FAILURE_INVALID_PATH if the p_pathname doesn't have a path (e.g. C:, calc.exe, ?qwa)
//          FAILURE_API_CALL if there is an error from the underlying API calls
int get_base_path_from_pathname( const char*  const p_pathname,
                                 size_t             pathname_size,
                                 char* const        p_basepath,
                                 size_t             basepath_size );

int get_base_path_from_pathname( const char*  const p_pathname,
                                 size_t             pathname_size,
                                 char* const        p_basepath,
                                 size_t             basepath_size )
{
  char*  p_end_of_path;
  size_t path_length;
  int    return_code;

  // Parameter Validation
  if( p_pathname == NULL || p_basepath == NULL ) { return FAILURE_NULL_ARGUMENT; }
  if( pathname_size < 1 || basepath_size < 1 ) { return FAILURE_INVALID_ARGUMENTS; }

  // Returns a pointer to the last occurrence of \ in p_pathname or NULL if it is not found
  p_end_of_path = strrchr( p_pathname, '\\' );
  if( p_end_of_path == NULL )
  {
    // There is no path part
    return FAILURE_INVALID_PATH;
  } 
  else 
  {
    path_length = (size_t)( p_end_of_path - p_pathname + 1 );

    // Do some sanity checks on the length
    if( path_length < 1 ) { return FAILURE_INVALID_PATH; }
    if( ( path_length + 1 ) > basepath_size ) { return FAILURE_BUFFER_TOO_SMALL; }

    // Copy the base path into the out variable
    if( strncpy( p_basepath, p_pathname, path_length ) != 0 ) { return FAILURE_API_CALL; }
    p_basepath[path_length] = '\0';
  }

  return SUCCESS;
}