gawk: Extension Intro

1 
1 16.1 Introduction
1 =================
1 
1 An "extension" (sometimes called a "plug-in") is a piece of external
1 compiled code that 'gawk' can load at runtime to provide additional
1 functionality, over and above the built-in capabilities described in the
1 rest of this Info file.
1 
1    Extensions are useful because they allow you (of course) to extend
1 'gawk''s functionality.  For example, they can provide access to system
1 calls (such as 'chdir()' to change directory) and to other C library
1 routines that could be of use.  As with most software, "the sky is the
1 limit"; if you can imagine something that you might want to do and can
1 write in C or C++, you can write an extension to do it!
1 
1    Extensions are written in C or C++, using the "application
1 programming interface" (API) defined for this purpose by the 'gawk'
1 developers.  The rest of this major node explains the facilities that
1 the API provides and how to use them, and presents a small example
1 extension.  In addition, it documents the sample extensions included in
11 the 'gawk' distribution and describes the 'gawkextlib' project.  ⇒
 Extension Design, for a discussion of the extension mechanism goals
1 and design.
1