intro(2)
NAME
intro, errno - introduction to system calls and error numbers
SYNOPSIS
#include <errno.h>
DESCRIPTION
This section describes all of the system calls. Most of these calls have
one or more error returns. An error condition is indicated by an
otherwise impossible return value. This is almost always -1; the
individual descriptions specify the details. Note that a number of
system calls overload the meanings of these error numbers, and that the
meanings must be interpreted according to the type and circumstances of
the call.
As with normal arguments, all return codes and values from functions are
of type integer unless otherwise noted. An error number is also made
available in the external variable errno, which is not cleared on
successful calls. Thus errno should be tested only after an error has
occurred.
The following is a complete list of the errors and their names as given
in <sys/errno.h>:
0 OK Error 0
Unused. (The symbol "OK" is only used inside the kernel source.)
1 EPERM Not owner
Typically this error indicates an attempt to modify a file in some way
forbidden except to its owner or super-user. It is also returned for
attempts by ordinary users to do things allowed only to the super-user.
2 ENOENT No such file or directory
This error occurs when a file name is specified and the file should exist
but doesn't, or when one of the directories in a path name does not
exist.
3 ESRCH No such process
The process or process group whose number was given does not exist, or
any such process is already dead.
4 EINTR Interrupted system call
An asynchronous signal (such as interrupt or quit) that the user has
elected to catch occurred during a system call. If execution is resumed
after processing the signal and the system call is not restarted, it will
appear as if the interrupted system call returned this error condition.
5 EIO I/O error
Some physical I/O error occurred during an I/O operation, usually read or
write. Operations on file descriptors that refer to devices that are
forcefully taken away or in a bad state will also provoke this error.
6 ENXIO No such device or address
I/O on a special file refers to a subdevice that does not exist, or
beyond the limits of the device. It may also occur when, for example, an
illegal tape drive unit number is selected or a disk pack is not loaded
on a drive.
7 E2BIG Arg list too long
An argument list longer than ARG_MAX bytes is presented to execve.
ARG_MAX is set to 4096 bytes for 16-bit Minix, 16384 bytes for 32-bit
Minix, and unlimited for Minix-vmd as these systems are released.
8 ENOEXEC Exec format error
A request is made to execute a file that, although it has the appropriate
permissions, does not start with a valid magic number, (see a.out(5)).
9 EBADF Bad file number
Either a file descriptor refers to no open file, or a read (resp. write)
request is made to a file that is open only for writing (resp. reading).
10 ECHILD No children
Wait and the process has no living or unwaited-for children.
11 EAGAIN Resource temporarily unavailable
In a fork, the system's process table is full or the user is not allowed
to create any more processes, otherwise an operation that would cause a
process to block was attempted on an object in non-blocking mode (see
fcntl(2)).
12 ENOMEM Not enough core
During an execve or brk, a program asks for more (virtual) memory than
the system is able to supply, or a process size limit would be exceeded.
The maximum size of the data+stack segment is set by the chmem(1)
program. For Minix-vmd a small data+stack size is increased to 3
megabytes when a program is executed.
13 EACCES Permission denied
An attempt was made to access a file in a way forbidden by the protection
system. Also an attempt to open a device for writing that is physically
write protected.
14 EFAULT Bad address
An argument of a system call is outside the address space allocated to a
process.
15 ENOTBLK Block device required
A plain file was mentioned where a block device was required, e.g., in
mount.
16 EBUSY Resource busy
An attempt to mount a device that was already mounted or an attempt was
made to dismount a device on which there is an active file (open file,
current directory, mounted-on file, or active text segment). A request
was made to an exclusive access device that was already in use.
17 EEXIST File exists
An existing file was mentioned in an inappropriate context, e.g., link.
18 EXDEV Cross-device link
A hard link to a file on another device was attempted.
19 ENODEV No such device
An attempt was made to access a device that is not configured by the
system, i.e., there is no driver for the device.
20 ENOTDIR Not a directory
A non-directory was specified where a directory is required, for example,
in a path name or as an argument to chdir.
21 EISDIR Is a directory
An attempt to write on a directory.
22 EINVAL Invalid argument
Some invalid argument: dismounting a non-mounted device, mentioning an
unknown signal in signal, or some other argument inappropriate for the
call. Also set by math functions, (see math(3)).
23 ENFILE File table overflow
The system's table of open files is full, and temporarily no more opens
can be accepted.
24 EMFILE Too many open files
The limit on the number of open files per process, OPEN_MAX, is reached.
As released, this limit is 20 for Minix, and 30 for Minix-vmd.
25 ENOTTY Not a typewriter
The file mentioned in an ioctl is not a terminal or one of the devices to
which this call applies. (Often seen error from programs with bugs in
their error reporting code.)
26 ETXTBSY Text file busy
Attempt to execute a program that is open for writing. Obsolete under
Minix.
27 EFBIG File too large
The size of a file exceeded the maximum (little over 64 megabytes for the
V2 file system).
28 ENOSPC No space left on device
A write to an ordinary file, the creation of a directory or symbolic
link, or the creation of a directory entry failed because no more disk
blocks are available on the file system, or the allocation of an inode
for a newly created file failed because no more inodes are available on
the file system.
29 ESPIPE Illegal seek
An lseek was issued to a pipe or TCP/IP channel. This error may also be
issued for other non-seekable devices.
30 EROFS Read-only file system
An attempt to modify a file or directory was made on a device mounted
read-only.
31 EMLINK Too many links
An attempt to make more than a certain number of hard links to a file.
The advertized maximum, LINK_MAX, is 127, but Minix-vmd uses a much
larger maximum of 32767 for the V2 file system.
32 EPIPE Broken pipe
A write on a pipe or TCP/IP channel for which there is no process to read
the data. This condition normally generates the signal SIGPIPE; the
error is returned if the signal is caught or ignored.
33 EDOM Math argument
The argument of a function in the math package is out of the domain of
the function.
34 ERANGE Result too large
The value of a function in the math package is unrepresentable within
machine precision.
35 EDEADLK Resource deadlock avoided
A process attempts to place a blocking lock on a file that is already
locked by another process and that process is waiting for the first
process to unlock a file that first process already has a lock on. (The
classic "lock A, lock B" by process 1, and "lock B, lock A" by process
2.)
36 ENAMETOOLONG File name too long
The path name exceeds PATH_MAX characters. PATH_MAX equals 255 as
distributed.
37 ENOLCK No locks available
The system's table of active locks is full.
38 ENOSYS Function not implemented
The system call is not supported. Either an old program uses an obsolete
call, or a program for a more capable system is run on a less capable
system.
39 ENOTEMPTY Directory not empty
A directory with entries other than "." and ".." was supplied to a remove
directory or rename call.
40 ELOOP Too many symbolic links
A path name lookup involved more than SYMLOOP symbolic links. SYMLOOP
equals 8 as distributed. (Minix-vmd)
50 EPACKSIZE Invalid packet size
51 EOUTOFBUFS Not enough buffers left
52 EBADIOCTL Illegal ioctl for device
53 EBADMODE Bad mode in ioctl
54 EWOULDBLOCK Would block
55 EBADDEST Bad destination address
56 EDSTNOTRCH Destination not reachable
57 EISCONN Already connected
58 EADDRINUSE Address in use
59 ECONNREFUSED Connection refused
60 ECONNRESET Connection reset
61 ETIMEDOUT Connection timed out
62 EURG Urgent data present
63 ENOURG No urgent data present
64 ENOTCONN No connection
65 ESHUTDOWN Already shutdown
66 ENOCONN No such connection
67 EINPROGRESS Operation now in progress
68 EALREADY Operation already in progress
DEFINITIONS
Process ID
Each active process in the system is uniquely identified by a
positive integer called a process ID. The range of this ID is from
1 to 29999. The special process with process ID 1 is init, the
ancestor of all processes.
Parent process ID
A new process is created by a currently active process; (see
fork(2)). The parent process ID of a process is the process ID of
its creator, unless the creator dies, then init becomes the parent
of the orphaned process.
Process Group ID
Each active process is a member of a process group that is
identified by a positive integer called the process group ID. This
is the process ID of the group leader. This grouping permits the
signaling of related processes (see kill(2)).
Real User ID and Real Group ID
Each user on the system is identified by a positive integer termed
the real user ID.
Each user is also a member of one or more groups. One of these
groups is distinguished from others and used in implementing
accounting facilities. The positive integer corresponding to this
distinguished group is termed the real group ID. (Under standard
Minix this is the only group a process can be a member of.)
All processes have a real user ID and real group ID. These are
initialized from the equivalent attributes of the process that
created it.
Effective User Id, Effective Group Id, and Access Groups
Access to system resources is governed by three values: the
effective user ID, the effective group ID, and the group access
list.
The effective user ID and effective group ID are initially the
process's real user ID and real group ID respectively. Either may
be modified through execution of a set-user-ID or set-group-ID file
(possibly by one its ancestors) (see execve(2)).
The group access list is an additional set of group ID's used only
in determining resource accessibility. Access checks are performed
as described below in ``File Access Permissions''. The maximum
number of additional group ID's is NGROUPS_MAX. For Minix this is
0, but Minix-vmd supports a list of up to 16 additional group ID's.
(Also known as ``supplemental'' group ID's.)
Super-user
A process is recognized as a super-user process and is granted
special privileges if its effective user ID is 0.
Descriptor
An integer assigned by the system when a file or device is
referenced by open(2), dup(2) or fcntl(2) which uniquely identifies
an access path to that file or device from a given process or any of
its children.
File Descriptor
Older, and often used name for a descriptor.
File Name
Names consisting of up to NAME_MAX characters may be used to name an
ordinary file, special file, or directory. NAME_MAX is the maximum
of the maximum file name lengths of the supported file systems.
Excess characters are ignored when too long file names are used for
files in a given file system. The maximum file name length of the
V1 and V2 file systems is 14 characters. The Minix-vmd "flex"
variants of V1 and V2 have a 60 character maximum.
The characters in a file name may assume any value representable in
eight bits excluding 0 (null) and the ASCII code for / (slash).
Note that it is generally unwise to use one of \'"<>();~$^&*|{}[]?
as part of file names because of the special meaning attached to
these characters by the shell.
Path Name
A path name is a null-terminated character string starting with an
optional slash (/), followed by zero or more directory names
separated by slashes, optionally followed by a file name. The total
length of a path name must be less than PATH_MAX characters (255 as
distributed.)
If a path name begins with a slash, the path search begins at the
root directory. Otherwise, the search begins from the current
working directory. A slash by itself names the root directory. A
null pathname is illegal, use "." to refer to the current working
directory.
Directory
A directory is a special type of file that contains entries that are
references to other files. Directory entries are called links. By
convention, a directory contains at least two links, . and ..,
referred to as dot and dot-dot respectively. Dot refers to the
directory itself and dot-dot refers to its parent directory.
Root Directory and Current Working Directory
Each process has associated with it a concept of a root directory
and a current working directory for the purpose of resolving path
name searches. A process's root directory need not be the root
directory of the root file system.
File Access Permissions
Every file in the file system has a set of access permissions.
These permissions are used in determining whether a process may
perform a requested operation on the file (such as opening a file
for writing). Access permissions are established at the time a file
is created. They may be changed at some later time through the
chmod(2) call.
File access is broken down according to whether a file may be: read,
written, or executed. Directory files use the execute permission to
control if the directory may be searched.
File access permissions are interpreted by the system as they apply
to three different classes of users: the owner of the file, those
users in the file's group, anyone else. Every file has an
independent set of access permissions for each of these classes.
When an access check is made, the system decides if permission
should be granted by checking the access information applicable to
the caller.
Read, write, and execute/search permissions on a file are granted to
a process if:
The process's effective user ID is that of the super-user.
The process's effective user ID matches the user ID of the owner of
the file and the owner permissions allow the access.
The process's effective user ID does not match the user ID of the
owner of the file, and either the process's effective group ID
matches the group ID of the file, or the group ID of the file is in
the process's group access list, and the group permissions allow the
access.
Neither the effective user ID nor effective group ID and group
access list of the process match the corresponding user ID and group
ID of the file, but the permissions for ``other users'' allow
access.
Otherwise, permission is denied.
SEE ALSO
intro(3), strerror(3).