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Wildcard string compare (globbing)

By , 15 Feb 2005
 

Usage:

This is a fast, lightweight, and simple pattern matching function.

if (wildcmp("bl?h.*", "blah.jpg")) {
  //we have a match!
} else {
  //no match =(
}

Function:

int wildcmp(const char *wild, const char *string) {
  // Written by Jack Handy - <A href="mailto:jakkhandy@hotmail.com">jakkhandy@hotmail.com</A>
  const char *cp = NULL, *mp = NULL;

  while ((*string) && (*wild != '*')) {
    if ((*wild != *string) && (*wild != '?')) {
      return 0;
    }
    wild++;
    string++;
  }

  while (*string) {
    if (*wild == '*') {
      if (!*++wild) {
        return 1;
      }
      mp = wild;
      cp = string+1;
    } else if ((*wild == *string) || (*wild == '?')) {
      wild++;
      string++;
    } else {
      wild = mp;
      string = cp++;
    }
  }

  while (*wild == '*') {
    wild++;
  }
  return !*wild;
}

License

This article has no explicit license attached to it but may contain usage terms in the article text or the download files themselves. If in doubt please contact the author via the discussion board below.

A list of licenses authors might use can be found here

About the Author

 Jack Handy
Web Developer
United States United States
Member
No Biography provided

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GeneralDoesnt seem to work well..sussBikram Singh13 May '04 - 1:56 
Tried these wildcards, and they show different results in your code and in Windows Explorer's search command.
 
??x*
*so*
??so*
??so??
 
Lack of comments in the code also make it a bit difficult to understand. On the whole however, good job!

 

Bikram
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GeneralRe: Doesnt seem to work well..memberJack Handy21 Jun '04 - 9:13 
The Windows Explorer search is not a straight wildcard match. It essentially adds *'s to either end of your input string so "b?r" matches "foobar.txt". I take a more literal approach. This function does not presume to be smarter than the caller. It is not only meant for files, it is also very useful for checking hostmasks for example.
 
If you think my function is producing bad results, can you paste an example of the string along with the wildcard?
 
Thanks,
 
Jack
 

There are 10 types of people in this world, those that understand binary and those who don't.
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GeneralCase Insensitive wildcmpmemberTechiex16 Mar '04 - 9:36 
I want case insenstive wildcmp function. Could anyone help me?
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GeneralRe: Case Insensitive wildcmpmemberNeville Franks16 Mar '04 - 9:52 
Simply wrap the code that compares charaters in toupper() calls.
 
eg.
    if ((toupper(*wild) != toupper(*string)) && (*wild != '?')) {

 
Neville Franks, Author of ED for Windows www.getsoft.com and coming soon: Surfulater www.surfulater.com
 
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GeneralRe: Case Insensitive wildcmpmemberTechiex23 Mar '04 - 9:33 
toupper doesnt support char characters. You could optimize this code.
This code compares also multilingual characters
 


#include

#define BIT5 0x20

char buf[] = "this is ®Ñê test";
char *pbuf;

int lower(int ch);


int lower(int ch)
{
if ((ch==64)||(ch==91)||(ch==92)||(ch==93))
return ch &= ~(ch & BIT5);
return ch |= BIT5;
}

int wildcmp(char *wild, char *string) {
char *cp, *mp;

while ((*string) && (*wild != '*')) {
if ((*wild != *string) && (*wild != '?')) {
return 0;
}
wild++;
string++;
}

while (*string) {
if (*wild == '*') {
if (!*++wild) {
return 1;
}
mp = wild;
cp = string+1;
} else if ((*wild == *string) || (*wild == '?')) {
wild++;
string++;
} else {
wild = mp;
string = cp++;
}
}
 
while (*wild == '*') {
wild++;
}
return !*wild;
}
 

int main() {

for (pbuf = &buf[0]; *pbuf; ++pbuf)
*pbuf= lower (*pbuf);

if (wildcmp("*®ñê*", buf)){
printf ("match : %s \n", buf);
} else {
printf ("not match: %s \n",buf);
}
}
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GeneralRe: Case Insensitive wildcmpmemberDavidCrow23 Feb '05 - 2:24 
Techiex wrote:
toupper doesnt support char characters
 
Since when?
 
ASSERT('A' == toupper('a'));

 

"Opinions are neither right nor wrong. I cannot change your opinion. I can, however, change what influences your opinion." - David Crow
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GeneralRe: Case Insensitive wildcmpmemberVic Mackey23 Feb '05 - 8:00 
Be careful when using toupper(), some of the CRT variations of this function _only_ work when the input is known to be lowercase. For example, the return value is invalid for _toupper('A') and some implementations of toupper('A') as well...check the documentation.
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GeneralRe: Case Insensitive wildcmpmemberDavidCrow23 Feb '05 - 8:22 
Vic Mackey wrote:
Be careful when using toupper(), some of the CRT variations of this function _only_ work when the input is known to be lowercase.
 
Which is why I specified toupper() instead of _toupper(). The latter is nothing but a #define directive that does no checking.
 
In any case, I was simply responding to Techiex's statement that "toupper doesnt support char characters."
 

"Opinions are neither right nor wrong. I cannot change your opinion. I can, however, change what influences your opinion." - David Crow
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GeneralRe: Case Insensitive wildcmpmemberf_randy12 Jun '06 - 18:13 
Doesnt seems to work for me.
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GeneralExcellent code!memberHans Dietrich16 Jul '03 - 19:40 
Very nice, compact, works great and is very fast. Thanks, Jack!
 
Best wishes,
Hans
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About Article
Matches a string against a wildcard string such as "*.*" or "bl?h.*" etc. This is good for file globbing or to match hostmasks.
Type Article
Licence 
First Posted 1 May 2001
Views 683,535
Bookmarked 89 times

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