Unix/C++: Open new terminal and redirect output to it

Question

My program (C++ on Solaris 10) writes output via wcout to its terminal when it is started from a shell. But when I execute it from within Sun Studio or the file manager is does not have a terminal and the ouput appears in the Sun Studio output window or nowhere at all.

I would like it to open its own terminal window in any of the three cases and attach wcout to this terminal window. I want this to be done be the program itself with C++ system calls not by the way how the program is executed from some shell or script. Because then execution in the Studio IDE and double-click in the file manager would still have the same effect.

Being a Windows programmer that seems quite natural to me but I could not find out how this is done in my Unix books nor in the web. Am I requesting the wrong thing, is it really so hard to do or am I missing something?

Answer 1

The following is close to what you want. It still has a few bugs:

• The xterm cannot be normally closed (it closes when the program terminates, though). I have no idea why this is so.
• Before the intended output, a number is output. Again, I have no idea why.
• I don't seem to be able to redirect input.

Maybe someone else know how to fix those bugs (and any others I might not have noticed).

#include <stdlib.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <iostream>
#include <sstream>

int main()
{
  int pt = posix_openpt(O_RDWR);
  if (pt == -1)
  {
    std::cerr << "Could not open pseudo terminal.\n";
    return EXIT_FAILURE;
  }
  char* ptname = ptsname(pt);
  if (!ptname)
  {
    std::cerr << "Could not get pseudo terminal device name.\n";
    close(pt);
    return EXIT_FAILURE;
  }

  if (unlockpt(pt) == -1)
  {
    std::cerr << "Could not get pseudo terminal device name.\n";
    close(pt);
    return EXIT_FAILURE;
  }

  std::ostringstream oss;
  oss << "xterm -S" << (strrchr(ptname, '/')+1) << "/" << pt << " &";
  system(oss.str().c_str());

  int xterm_fd = open(ptname,O_RDWR);
  char c;
  do read(xterm_fd, &c, 1); while (c!='\n');

  if (dup2(pt, 1) <0)
  {
    std::cerr << "Could not redirect standard output.\n";
    close(pt);
    return EXIT_FAILURE;
  }
  if (dup2(pt, 2) <0)
  {
    std::cerr << "Could not redirect standard error output.\n";
    close(pt);
    return EXIT_FAILURE;
  }

  std::cout << "This should appear on the xterm." << std::endl;
  std::cerr << "So should this.\n";
  std::cin.ignore(1);

  close(pt);
  return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}