Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!uw-june!ka
From: ka@june.cs.washington.edu (Kenneth Almquist)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: exec() with executable shell scripts
Summary: Executing programs that may be shell scripts.
Message-ID: <7954@june.cs.washington.edu>
Date: 23 Apr 89 09:40:31 GMT
References: <647@mqcomp.oz> <520@visdc.UUCP>
Organization: U of Washington, Computer Science, Seattle
Lines: 20

jiii@visdc.UUCP (John E Van Deusen III) writes:
> If you do not want to use [execlp or execvp], you have to do the
> following, (I have used execl for clarity):
>
> 	execl("/bin/sh", "sh", "-c", "/bin/true", 0);

More generally, you can write:

	execl(program, (char *)0);
	if (errno == ENOEXEC) {		/* it's a shell procedure */
		execl("/bin/sh", "sh", program, (char *)0);
		perror("/bin/sh");
	} else {
		perror(program);
	}
	exit(2);

Note that if you write "0" in place of "(char *)0" this code will no
longer be machine independent
				Kenneth Almquist