monitor directoriese : inotify or shell script while-true loop?

[Lakshmipathi]

On server-1 ,a shell script runs and scp the tar files to /opt in server-2. Now I want to check specific directory( /opt ) in server-2 for new arrivals and process them.

I have found two ways of doing it,
use inotify simple C program watches /opt
or a shell something like

while true; do
sleep 30;
ls -tr /opt| head -1
done

Which one is better?

[RobinVossen]

Doubt it really matters but I'd go for the C way.

[Lakshmipathi]

yes,Robin I have used inotify