[arielb1]

If you use some API other than system(3) - even if you literally use a shell-script - it's:

1) serialize data structure to semi-typed array of strings 2) pass array of strings directly to target program 3) have target program parse the array of strings to flags & parameters

With no shell or C library touching the command line arguments at all.

The only way this could be more direct would be if you used JSON instead of arrays of strings, web-API style.