Cygwin FIFO vs native Linux FIFO - discrepancy in blocking behaviour? - cygwin

Question

The code shown is based on an example using named pipes from some tutorial site
server.c
#include <stdio.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <string.h>
#define FIFO_FILE "MYFIFO"
int main()
{
int fd;
char readbuf[80];
int read_bytes;
// mknod(FIFO_FILE, S_IFIFO|0640, 0);
mkfifo(FIFO_FILE, 0777);
while(1) {
fd = open(FIFO_FILE, O_RDONLY);
read_bytes = read(fd, readbuf, sizeof(readbuf));
readbuf[read_bytes] = '\0';
printf("Received string: \"%s\". Length is %d\n", readbuf, (int)strlen(readbuf));
}
return 0;
}
When executing the server in Windows, using Cygwin, then the server enters an undesired loop, repeating the same message. For example, if you write in a shell:
$ ./server
|
then the "server" waits for the client, but when the FIFO is not empty, e.g. writing in a new shell
$ echo "Hello" > MYFIFO
then the server enters an infinite loop, repeating the "Hello"-string
Received string: "Hello". Length is 4
Received string: "Hello". Length is 4
...
Furthermore, new strings written to the fifo doesn't seem to be read by the server. However, in Linux the behaviour is quite different. In Linux, the server prints the string and waits for new data to appear on the fifo. What is the reason for this discrepancy ?

Answer 1

You need to fix your code to remove at least 3 bugs:
You're not doing a close(fd) so you will get a file descriptor leak and eventually be unable to open() new files.
You're not checking the value of fd (if it returns -1 then there was an error).
You're not checking the value of read (if it returns -1 then there was an error)... and your readbuf[read_bytes] = '\0'; will not be doing what you expect as a result.
When you get an error then errno will tell you what went wrong.
These bugs probably explain why you keep getting Hello output (especially the readbuf[read_bytes] problem).