How do I watch for file changes on OS X? - objective-c

Question

I would like to be notified of writes into a given file – without polling, without having to read from the file and without having to monitor the parent directory and watch the file modification time stamps. How do I do that?

Answer 1

I couldn’t find a simple example, so I’m contributing what I came up with for future reference:
#interface FileWatch ()
#property(assign) dispatch_source_t source;
#end
#implementation FileWatch
#synthesize source;
- (id) initWithPath: (NSString*) path targetQueue: (dispatch_queue_t) queue block: (dispatch_block_t) handler
{
self = [super init];
int descriptor = open([path fileSystemRepresentation], O_EVTONLY);
if (descriptor < 0) {
return nil;
}
[self setSource:dispatch_source_create(DISPATCH_SOURCE_TYPE_VNODE, descriptor, DISPATCH_VNODE_WRITE, queue)];
dispatch_source_set_event_handler(source, handler);
dispatch_source_set_cancel_handler(source, ^{
close(descriptor);
});
dispatch_resume(source);
return self;
}
- (void) dealloc
{
if (source) {
dispatch_source_cancel(source);
dispatch_release(source);
source = NULL;
}
}
#end

Answer 2

From my expericence, in some case files aren't only written but deleted then rewritten (the case for some plist files). Then you have to adapt the code a little bit : calling the method again when the files gets replaced in ordre to keep the monitoring.
- (void) myMonitoringMethodWithPath: :(NSString*) path
__block typeof(self) blockSelf = self;
__block dispatch_source_t source = dispatch_source_create(DISPATCH_SOURCE_TYPE_VNODE,fildes, DISPATCH_VNODE_DELETE | DISPATCH_VNODE_WRITE | DISPATCH_VNODE_EXTEND | DISPATCH_VNODE_ATTRIB | DISPATCH_VNODE_LINK | DISPATCH_VNODE_RENAME | DISPATCH_VNODE_REVOKE,
queue);
dispatch_source_set_event_handler(source, ^
{
unsigned long flags = dispatch_source_get_data(source);
//Do some stuff
if(flags & DISPATCH_VNODE_DELETE)
{
[blockSelf myMonitoringMethodWithPath:path];
}
});
dispatch_source_set_cancel_handler(source, ^(void)
{
close(fildes);
});
dispatch_resume(source);
}