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I think argv[0] is fine. It sounds like there is a lot of bad security scanning software that doesn't understand how the `exec` syscall works. That sounds lik

I think argv[0] is fine. It sounds like there is a lot of bad security scanning software that doesn't understand how the `exec` syscall works. That sounds like their problem and not a fundamental problem with argv[0]. Most people use argv[0] so they can do something like: $ mycommand help Type `mycommand foo bar` to foo bars. $ mycommand1.2.3 help Type `mycommand1.2.3 foo bar` to foo bars. This is admittedly less fun when mycommand is /home/jrockway/.cache/bazel/_bazel_jrockway/7f95bd5e6dcc2e75a861133ddc7aee82/execroot/_main/bazel-out/k8-fastbuild/mycommand/mycommand_/mycommand` however.

denysvitali 2y ago
I don't think argv[0] includes the full path (or at least some programming language strip the whole path and keep only the last part)
- denysvitali 2y ago
  I stand corrected - C, Go and Python are all consistent here and show the full path. I seem to recall there was a language that only provided the stripped part - but I guess my memory is failing me here. Sorry for the wrong information above.
  - jrockway 2y ago
    Languages might remove the dirname part, but argv[0] is not necessarily a path, it's just a string passed to the exec system call that is also passed to main(int argc, char *argv). While many languges don't call their main function that, somewhere in the runtime that's what it gets.
  - account42 2y ago
    It depends on the caller not on the language of the program being called. If you execute something via $PATH then most shells will only pass the command you typed and not the full path. Similarly, when you use a relative path like ./command then usually your argv0 will be that relative path and not the full path to the executable. So in practice argv may or may not be a full path and if it does not contain a slash then it generally isn't even a relative path (well, not relative to the current directory anyway). For the help case in gp I think it makes sens for programs to always strip away anything up to including the last slash from argv0.
yencabulator 2y ago
I routinely use basename(arg0) in my programs.

denysvitali 2y ago

I don't think argv[0] includes the full path (or at least some programming language strip the whole path and keep only the last part)

denysvitali 2y ago
I stand corrected - C, Go and Python are all consistent here and show the full path. I seem to recall there was a language that only provided the stripped part - but I guess my memory is failing me here. Sorry for the wrong information above.
- jrockway 2y ago
  Languages might remove the dirname part, but argv[0] is not necessarily a path, it's just a string passed to the exec system call that is also passed to main(int argc, char *argv). While many languges don't call their main function that, somewhere in the runtime that's what it gets.
- account42 2y ago
  It depends on the caller not on the language of the program being called. If you execute something via $PATH then most shells will only pass the command you typed and not the full path. Similarly, when you use a relative path like ./command then usually your argv0 will be that relative path and not the full path to the executable. So in practice argv may or may not be a full path and if it does not contain a slash then it generally isn't even a relative path (well, not relative to the current directory anyway). For the help case in gp I think it makes sens for programs to always strip away anything up to including the last slash from argv0.

yencabulator 2y ago

I routinely use basename(arg0) in my programs.