What's the best way to check if a file exists in C?

Question

Is there a better way than simply trying to open the file?

int exists(const char *fname)
{
    FILE *file;
    if ((file = fopen(fname, \"r\")))
    {
               


        

Answer 1

Use stat like this:

#include    // stat
#include     // bool type

bool file_exists (char *filename) {
  struct stat   buffer;   
  return (stat (filename, &buffer) == 0);
}

and call it like this:

#include       // printf

int main(int ac, char **av) {
    if (ac != 2)
        return 1;

    if (file_exists(av[1]))
        printf("%s exists\n", av[1]);
    else
        printf("%s does not exist\n", av[1]);

    return 0;
}