[c++] Send and Receive a file in socket programming in Linux with C/C++ (GCC/G++)

I would like to implement a client-server architecture running on Linux using sockets and C/C++ language that is capable of sending and receiving files. Is there any library that makes this task easy? Could anyone please provide an example?

Minimal runnable POSIX read + write example

Usage:

1. get two computers on a LAN.

   For example, this will work if both computers are connected to your home router in most cases, which is how I tested it.

2. On the server computer:

   1. Find the server local IP with ifconfig, e.g. 192.168.0.10

   2. Run:

      ./server output.tmp 12345
      

3. On the client computer:

   printf 'ab\ncd\n' > input.tmp
   ./client input.tmp 192.168.0.10 12345
   

4. Outcome: a file output.tmp is created on the sever computer containing 'ab\ncd\n'!

server.c

/*
Receive a file over a socket.

Saves it to output.tmp by default.

Interface:

    ./executable [<output_file> [<port>]]

Defaults:

- output_file: output.tmp
- port: 12345
*/

#define _XOPEN_SOURCE 700

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>

#include <arpa/inet.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <netdb.h> /* getprotobyname */
#include <netinet/in.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <sys/socket.h>
#include <unistd.h>

int main(int argc, char **argv) {
    char *file_path = "output.tmp";
    char buffer[BUFSIZ];
    char protoname[] = "tcp";
    int client_sockfd;
    int enable = 1;
    int filefd;
    int i;
    int server_sockfd;
    socklen_t client_len;
    ssize_t read_return;
    struct protoent *protoent;
    struct sockaddr_in client_address, server_address;
    unsigned short server_port = 12345u;

    if (argc > 1) {
        file_path = argv[1];
        if (argc > 2) {
            server_port = strtol(argv[2], NULL, 10);
        }
    }

    /* Create a socket and listen to it.. */
    protoent = getprotobyname(protoname);
    if (protoent == NULL) {
        perror("getprotobyname");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    server_sockfd = socket(
        AF_INET,
        SOCK_STREAM,
        protoent->p_proto
    );
    if (server_sockfd == -1) {
        perror("socket");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    if (setsockopt(server_sockfd, SOL_SOCKET, SO_REUSEADDR, &enable, sizeof(enable)) < 0) {
        perror("setsockopt(SO_REUSEADDR) failed");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    server_address.sin_family = AF_INET;
    server_address.sin_addr.s_addr = htonl(INADDR_ANY);
    server_address.sin_port = htons(server_port);
    if (bind(
            server_sockfd,
            (struct sockaddr*)&server_address,
            sizeof(server_address)
        ) == -1
    ) {
        perror("bind");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    if (listen(server_sockfd, 5) == -1) {
        perror("listen");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    fprintf(stderr, "listening on port %d\n", server_port);

    while (1) {
        client_len = sizeof(client_address);
        puts("waiting for client");
        client_sockfd = accept(
            server_sockfd,
            (struct sockaddr*)&client_address,
            &client_len
        );
        filefd = open(file_path,
                O_WRONLY | O_CREAT | O_TRUNC,
                S_IRUSR | S_IWUSR);
        if (filefd == -1) {
            perror("open");
            exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
        }
        do {
            read_return = read(client_sockfd, buffer, BUFSIZ);
            if (read_return == -1) {
                perror("read");
                exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
            }
            if (write(filefd, buffer, read_return) == -1) {
                perror("write");
                exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
            }
        } while (read_return > 0);
        close(filefd);
        close(client_sockfd);
    }
    return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}

client.c

/*
Send a file over a socket.

Interface:

    ./executable [<input_path> [<sever_hostname> [<port>]]]

Defaults:

- input_path: input.tmp
- server_hostname: 127.0.0.1
- port: 12345
*/

#define _XOPEN_SOURCE 700

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>

#include <arpa/inet.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <netdb.h> /* getprotobyname */
#include <netinet/in.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <sys/socket.h>
#include <unistd.h>

int main(int argc, char **argv) {
    char protoname[] = "tcp";
    struct protoent *protoent;
    char *file_path = "input.tmp";
    char *server_hostname = "127.0.0.1";
    char *server_reply = NULL;
    char *user_input = NULL;
    char buffer[BUFSIZ];
    in_addr_t in_addr;
    in_addr_t server_addr;
    int filefd;
    int sockfd;
    ssize_t i;
    ssize_t read_return;
    struct hostent *hostent;
    struct sockaddr_in sockaddr_in;
    unsigned short server_port = 12345;

    if (argc > 1) {
        file_path = argv[1];
        if (argc > 2) {
            server_hostname = argv[2];
            if (argc > 3) {
                server_port = strtol(argv[3], NULL, 10);
            }
        }
    }

    filefd = open(file_path, O_RDONLY);
    if (filefd == -1) {
        perror("open");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }

    /* Get socket. */
    protoent = getprotobyname(protoname);
    if (protoent == NULL) {
        perror("getprotobyname");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    sockfd = socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, protoent->p_proto);
    if (sockfd == -1) {
        perror("socket");
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    /* Prepare sockaddr_in. */
    hostent = gethostbyname(server_hostname);
    if (hostent == NULL) {
        fprintf(stderr, "error: gethostbyname(\"%s\")\n", server_hostname);
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    in_addr = inet_addr(inet_ntoa(*(struct in_addr*)*(hostent->h_addr_list)));
    if (in_addr == (in_addr_t)-1) {
        fprintf(stderr, "error: inet_addr(\"%s\")\n", *(hostent->h_addr_list));
        exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
    }
    sockaddr_in.sin_addr.s_addr = in_addr;
    sockaddr_in.sin_family = AF_INET;
    sockaddr_in.sin_port = htons(server_port);
    /* Do the actual connection. */
    if (connect(sockfd, (struct sockaddr*)&sockaddr_in, sizeof(sockaddr_in)) == -1) {
        perror("connect");
        return EXIT_FAILURE;
    }

    while (1) {
        read_return = read(filefd, buffer, BUFSIZ);
        if (read_return == 0)
            break;
        if (read_return == -1) {
            perror("read");
            exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
        }
        /* TODO use write loop: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/24259640/writing-a-full-buffer-using-write-system-call */
        if (write(sockfd, buffer, read_return) == -1) {
            perror("write");
            exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
        }
    }
    free(user_input);
    free(server_reply);
    close(filefd);
    exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
}

GitHub upstream.

Further comments

Possible improvements:

• Currently output.tmp gets overwritten each time a send is done.

  This begs for the creation of a simple protocol that allows to pass a filename so that multiple files can be uploaded, e.g.: filename up to the first newline character, max filename 256 chars, and the rest until socket closure are the contents. Of course, that would require sanitation to avoid a path transversal vulnerability.

  Alternatively, we could make a server that hashes the files to find filenames, and keeps a map from original paths to hashes on disk (on a database).

• Only one client can connect at a time.

  This is specially harmful if there are slow clients whose connections last for a long time: the slow connection halts everyone down.

  One way to work around that is to fork a process / thread for each accept, start listening again immediately, and use file lock synchronization on the files.

• Add timeouts, and close clients if they take too long. Or else it would be easy to do a DoS.

  poll or select are some options: How to implement a timeout in read function call?

A simple HTTP wget implementation is shown at: How to make an HTTP get request in C without libcurl?

Tested on Ubuntu 15.10.

This file will serve you as a good sendfile example : http://tldp.org/LDP/LGNET/91/misc/tranter/server.c.txt

Do aman 2 sendfile. You only need to open the source file on the client and destination file on the server, then call sendfile and the kernel will chop and move the data.