FNMATCH

Section: Linux Programmer's Manual (3)
Updated: 2015-12-28
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NAME

fnmatch - match filename or pathname  

SYNOPSIS

#include <fnmatch.h>

int fnmatch(const char *pattern, const char *string, int flags);

 

DESCRIPTION

The fnmatch() function checks whether the string argument matches the pattern argument, which is a shell wildcard pattern.

The flags argument modifies the behavior; it is the bitwise OR of zero or more of the following flags:

FNM_NOESCAPE

If this flag is set, treat backslash as an ordinary character, instead of an escape character.

FNM_PATHNAME

If this flag is set, match a slash in string only with a slash in pattern and not by an asterisk (*) or a question mark (?) metacharacter, nor by a bracket expression ([]) containing a slash.

FNM_PERIOD

If this flag is set, a leading period in string has to be matched exactly by a period in pattern. A period is considered to be leading if it is the first character in string, or if both FNM_PATHNAME is set and the period immediately follows a slash.

FNM_FILE_NAME

This is a GNU synonym for FNM_PATHNAME.

FNM_LEADING_DIR

If this flag (a GNU extension) is set, the pattern is considered to be matched if it matches an initial segment of string which is followed by a slash. This flag is mainly for the internal use of glibc and is implemented only in certain cases.

FNM_CASEFOLD

If this flag (a GNU extension) is set, the pattern is matched case-insensitively.

FNM_EXTMATCH

If this flag (a GNU extension) is set, extended patterns are supported, as introduced by 'ksh' and now supported by other shells. The extended format is as follows, with pattern-list being a '|' separated list of patterns.

'?(pattern-list)'

The pattern matches if zero or one occurrences of any of the patterns in the pattern-list match the input string.

'*(pattern-list)'

The pattern matches if zero or more occurrences of any of the patterns in the pattern-list match the input string.

'+(pattern-list)'

The pattern matches if one or more occurrences of any of the patterns in the pattern-list match the input string.

'@(pattern-list)'

The pattern matches if exactly one occurrence of any of the patterns in the pattern-list match the input string.

'!(pattern-list)'

The pattern matches if the input string cannot be matched with any of the patterns in the pattern-list.

 

RETURN VALUE

Zero if string matches pattern, FNM_NOMATCH if there is no match or another nonzero value if there is an error.  

ATTRIBUTES

For an explanation of the terms used in this section, see attributes(7).

Interface	Attribute	Value
fnmatch()	Thread safety	MT-Safe env locale

 

CONFORMING TO

POSIX.1-2001, POSIX.1-2008, POSIX.2. The FNM_FILE_NAME, FNM_LEADING_DIR, and FNM_CASEFOLD flags are GNU extensions.  

SEE ALSO

sh(1), glob(3), scandir(3), wordexp(3), glob(7)  

COLOPHON

This page is part of release 4.13 of the Linux man-pages project. A description of the project, information about reporting bugs, and the latest version of this page, can be found at https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.

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Index

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

RETURN VALUE

ATTRIBUTES

CONFORMING TO

SEE ALSO

COLOPHON