README.md[Uploading README.# Mini Shell Project

This is a simple command line shell that I built in C as a personal project. It works on Unix systems and lets me run commands, navigate directories, and chain programs together using pipes. The goal of this project is to understand how a shell works under the hood and practice systems programming in C.

Features

• Run normal commands like ls, pwd, or any program installed on the system.

• Built-in commands:

  • cd to change directories
  • exit to quit the shell

• Supports pipes so I can connect commands, for example:

  ls | grep src

  echo hello | wc -c

• Handles quoted strings and escaped spaces, so commands like this work:

  cd "My Project Folder"

  echo hello\ world

How to Compile and Run

1. Clone the repository:

git clone <your-repo-url>
cd Mini\ Shell\ Project

2. Build the shell using make:

make

3. Run the shell:

./mini-shell

4. Use it like a normal shell:

mini-shell> ls
mini-shell> cd src
mini-shell> echo hello | wc -c
mini-shell> exit

Project Structure

Mini Shell Project/
├── include/         # header files
│   └── shell.h
├── src/             # source code files
│   ├── main.c
│   ├── parser.c
│   ├── executor.c
│   └── builtins.c
├── Makefile
└── README.md

What I Learned

Through this project, I learned:

How a shell interprets commands and arguments. How to use fork, execvp, and pipe to run programs and connect their input/output. How to handle quoting, escaped characters, and pipes in a simple parser. How to structure a C project with multiple files and headers.

This project is now a working mini-shell, and I plan to expand it in the future with more features like file redirection and multiple built-in commands. md…]()