Checking if a file is a directory or just a file [duplicate]

Answer 1

Yes, there is better. Check the stat or the fstat function

Answer 2

You can call the stat() function and use the S_ISREG() macro on the st_mode field of the stat structure in order to determine if your path points to a regular file:

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <unistd.h>

int is_regular_file(const char *path)
{
    struct stat path_stat;
    stat(path, &path_stat);
    return S_ISREG(path_stat.st_mode);
}

Note that there are other file types besides regular and directory, like devices, pipes, symbolic links, sockets, etc. You might want to take those into account.

Answer 3

Normally you want to perform this check atomically with using the result, so stat() is useless. Instead, open() the file read-only first and use fstat(). If it's a directory, you can then use fdopendir() to read it. Or you can try opening it for writing to begin with, and the open will fail if it's a directory. Some systems (POSIX 2008, Linux) also have an O_DIRECTORY extension to open which makes the call fail if the name is not a directory.

Your method with opendir() is also good if you want a directory, but you should not close it afterwards; you should go ahead and use it.

Answer 4

Use the S_ISDIRmacro:

int isDirectory(const char *path) {
   struct stat statbuf;
   if (stat(path, &statbuf) != 0)
       return 0;
   return S_ISDIR(statbuf.st_mode);
}