Two processes substracting a number using pipe - process

Question

Having difficulty to make two processes comunicate through pipe and substract a number alternatively.
Output should be like:
process1: 9
process2: 8
process1: 7...
What I've did so far:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/wait.h>
int main() {
int p2c[2];
int c2p[2];
int n = 9;
pipe(p2c);
pipe(c2p);
write(p2c[1], &n, sizeof(int));
if(fork() == 0) {
read(p2c[0], &n, sizeof(int));
printf("Got from parent: %d", n);
n--;
write(c2p[1], &n, sizeof(int));
close(p2c[0]);
close(p2c[1]);
close(c2p[0]);
close(c2p[1]);
exit(0);
}
else{
read(c2p[0], &n, sizeof(int));
printf("Got from child: %d", n);
n--;
write(p2c[1], &n; sizeof(int));
close(p2c[0]);
close(p2c[1]);
close(c2p[0]);
close(c2p[1]);
}
return 0;
}
Whith the output:
Got from parent:9
Got from child:8
What's the proper way to get these two processes substract the number till 0?

Answer 1

It makes sense that you're only getting "Got from parent:9 Got from child:8" as a result, you need, you need a while or for loop for both child and parent processes to get what you're expecting, and the stop conditions for those loops are (n < 0) after decrementing n or the write end of pipe get closed:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/wait.h>
int main() {
int p2c[2];
int c2p[2];
int n = 9;
pipe(p2c);
pipe(c2p);
// this is important to prevent deadlock situation, at least one of both processes
// must start a write operation before while loop, unless the read will block and
// and each process still waiting the other to write something on the pipe
write(p2c[1], &n, sizeof(int));
if(fork() == 0) {
int readStatus;
while(1){
readStatus=read(p2c[0], &n, sizeof(int));
// when read returns 0, this means the write end of pipe was closed, so we have to break the loop
// because no more data to recieve
if(readStatus == 0) break;
printf("Got from parent: %d\n", n);
n--;
// we check if n less than 0, if yes we are finished
if(n < 0) break;
write(c2p[1], &n, sizeof(int));
}
close(p2c[0]);
close(p2c[1]);
close(c2p[0]);
close(c2p[1]);
exit(0);
}
else{
int readStatus;
while(1){
readStatus= read(c2p[0], &n, sizeof(int));
if(readStatus == 0) break;
printf("Got from child: %d\n", n);
n--;
if(n < 0) break;
write(p2c[1], &n, sizeof(int));
}
close(p2c[0]);
close(p2c[1]);
close(c2p[0]);
close(c2p[1]);
}
return 0;
}