Using code to use a different program, for my program?

I'll start off by saying that I began programming about a month and a half ago, and being a "math person" it was mostly intuitive to me. So I would classify myslef somewhere in-between beginner and average.
Anyway, My English teacher brought up a "Game" where you pick two words. And using dictionary definitions of one word, you have to pick a word in the definition, go to it, find its definition, and so on and so forth until you finally reach the second word you picked.

For example: Pick the words Finesse and Aggregate

Using Dictionary.com (Just using the most convenient resource) the definition of Finesse is Extreme delicacy or subtlety in action, performance, skill, discrimination, taste.

So I go to extreme, and it is defined as Of a character or kind farthest removed from the ordinary or average: extreme measures.

So I go to Character, which is defined as The aggregate of features and traits that form the individual nature of some person or thing.

And Thus I have reached Aggregate!

My point in all this is that I would like to write a program do be able to play the game.

This could often take a long time, but I hope you see the point of the "program in my head." The
goal of the program would be to find and display the shortest possible path from one word to another.

So on my quest, I downloaded WordWeb, to see if I could dissect it's files and source code to give me a hint or a database to use, but I couldn't find a way to accomplish this on Ubuntu.
So my question is, could I somehow tell my program to use word web, and find the path between two words? I'm not asking you to write the algorithm for me, just wondering if there is a way to tell my program to run an executable file and use it, while the code is running. Thanks!

(Also I plan to use linux terminal as the interface)
I am not familiar with WordWeb. If it also runs in a linux terminal, you could call it from your program and gather its results to continue with your processing.

See the function system(char*) for how to call one program from another.

Also research "pipe" to learn how to get the information from WordWeb back to your own program.

Here's an external link to StackOverflow that may give you an idea of using pipes.

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