PROLOG | NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | RETURN VALUE | ERRORS | EXAMPLES | APPLICATION USAGE | RATIONALE | FUTURE DIRECTIONS | SEE ALSO | COPYRIGHT

FSTATAT(3P)               POSIX Programmer's Manual              FSTATAT(3P)

PROLOG         top

       This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux
       implementation of this interface may differ (consult the
       corresponding Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior), or
       the interface may not be implemented on Linux.

NAME         top

       fstatat, lstat, stat — get file status

SYNOPSIS         top

       #include <sys/stat.h>
       int fstatat(int fd, const char *restrict path,
           struct stat *restrict buf, int flag);
       int lstat(const char *restrict path, struct stat *restrict buf);
       int stat(const char *restrict path, struct stat *restrict buf);

DESCRIPTION         top

       The stat() function shall obtain information about the named file and
       write it to the area pointed to by the buf argument. The path
       argument points to a pathname naming a file. Read, write, or execute
       permission of the named file is not required. An implementation that
       provides additional or alternate file access control mechanisms may,
       under implementation-defined conditions, cause stat() to fail. In
       particular, the system may deny the existence of the file specified
       by path.
       If the named file is a symbolic link, the stat() function shall
       continue pathname resolution using the contents of the symbolic link,
       and shall return information pertaining to the resulting file if the
       file exists.
       The buf argument is a pointer to a stat structure, as defined in the
       <sys/stat.h> header, into which information is placed concerning the
       file.
       The stat() function shall update any time-related fields (as
       described in the Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section
       4.8, File Times Update), before writing into the stat structure.
       If the named file is a shared memory object, the implementation shall
       update in the stat structure pointed to by the buf argument the
       st_uid, st_gid, st_size, and st_mode fields, and only the S_IRUSR,
       S_IWUSR, S_IRGRP, S_IWGRP, S_IROTH, and S_IWOTH file permission bits
       need be valid. The implementation may update other fields and flags.
       If the named file is a typed memory object, the implementation shall
       update in the stat structure pointed to by the buf argument the
       st_uid, st_gid, st_size, and st_mode fields, and only the S_IRUSR,
       S_IWUSR, S_IRGRP, S_IWGRP, S_IROTH, and S_IWOTH file permission bits
       need be valid. The implementation may update other fields and flags.
       For all other file types defined in this volume of POSIX.1‐2008, the
       structure members st_mode, st_ino, st_dev, st_uid, st_gid, st_atim,
       st_ctim, and st_mtim shall have meaningful values and the value of
       the member st_nlink shall be set to the number of links to the file.
       The lstat() function shall be equivalent to stat(), except when path
       refers to a symbolic link. In that case lstat() shall return
       information about the link, while stat() shall return information
       about the file the link references.
       For symbolic links, the st_mode member shall contain meaningful
       information when used with the file type macros. The file mode bits
       in st_mode are unspecified. The structure members st_ino, st_dev,
       st_uid, st_gid, st_atim, st_ctim, and st_mtim shall have meaningful
       values and the value of the st_nlink member shall be set to the
       number of (hard) links to the symbolic link.  The value of the
       st_size member shall be set to the length of the pathname contained
       in the symbolic link not including any terminating null byte.
       The fstatat() function shall be equivalent to the stat() or lstat()
       function, depending on the value of flag (see below), except in the
       case where path specifies a relative path. In this case the status
       shall be retrieved from a file relative to the directory associated
       with the file descriptor fd instead of the current working directory.
       If the file descriptor was opened without O_SEARCH, the function
       shall check whether directory searches are permitted using the
       current permissions of the directory underlying the file descriptor.
       If the file descriptor was opened with O_SEARCH, the function shall
       not perform the check.
       Values for flag are constructed by a bitwise-inclusive OR of flags
       from the following list, defined in <fcntl.h>:
       AT_SYMLINK_NOFOLLOW
             If path names a symbolic link, the status of the symbolic link
             is returned.
       If fstatat() is passed the special value AT_FDCWD in the fd
       parameter, the current working directory shall be used and the
       behavior shall be identical to a call to stat() or lstat()
       respectively, depending on whether or not the AT_SYMLINK_NOFOLLOW bit
       is set in flag.

RETURN VALUE         top

       Upon successful completion, these functions shall return 0.
       Otherwise, these functions shall return −1 and set errno to indicate
       the error.

ERRORS         top

       These functions shall fail if:
       EACCES Search permission is denied for a component of the path
              prefix.
       EIO    An error occurred while reading from the file system.
       ELOOP  A loop exists in symbolic links encountered during resolution
              of the path argument.
       ENAMETOOLONG
              The length of a component of a pathname is longer than
              {NAME_MAX}.
       ENOENT A component of path does not name an existing file or path is
              an empty string.
       ENOTDIR
              A component of the path prefix names an existing file that is
              neither a directory nor a symbolic link to a directory, or the
              path argument contains at least one non-<slash> character and
              ends with one or more trailing <slash> characters and the last
              pathname component names an existing file that is neither a
              directory nor a symbolic link to a directory.
       EOVERFLOW
              The file size in bytes or the number of blocks allocated to
              the file or the file serial number cannot be represented
              correctly in the structure pointed to by buf.
       The fstatat() function shall fail if:
       EACCES fd was not opened with O_SEARCH and the permissions of the
              directory underlying fd do not permit directory searches.
       EBADF  The path argument does not specify an absolute path and the fd
              argument is neither AT_FDCWD nor a valid file descriptor open
              for reading or searching.
       ENOTDIR
              The path argument is not an absolute path and fd is a file
              descriptor associated with a non-directory file.
       These functions may fail if:
       ELOOP  More than {SYMLOOP_MAX} symbolic links were encountered during
              resolution of the path argument.
       ENAMETOOLONG
              The length of a pathname exceeds {PATH_MAX}, or pathname
              resolution of a symbolic link produced an intermediate result
              with a length that exceeds {PATH_MAX}.
       EOVERFLOW
              A value to be stored would overflow one of the members of the
              stat structure.
       The fstatat() function may fail if:
       EINVAL The value of the flag argument is not valid.
       The following sections are informative.

EXAMPLES         top

   Obtaining File Status Information
       The following example shows how to obtain file status information for
       a file named /home/cnd/mod1.  The structure variable buffer is
       defined for the stat structure.
           #include <sys/types.h>
           #include <sys/stat.h>
           #include <fcntl.h>
           struct stat buffer;
           int         status;
           ...
           status = stat("/home/cnd/mod1", &buffer);
   Getting Directory Information
       The following example fragment gets status information for each entry
       in a directory. The call to the stat() function stores file
       information in the stat structure pointed to by statbuf.  The lines
       that follow the stat() call format the fields in the stat structure
       for presentation to the user of the program.
           #include <sys/types.h>
           #include <sys/stat.h>
           #include <dirent.h>
           #include <pwd.h>
           #include <grp.h>
           #include <time.h>
           #include <locale.h>
           #include <langinfo.h>
           #include <stdio.h>
           #include <stdint.h>
           struct dirent  *dp;
           struct stat     statbuf;
           struct passwd  *pwd;
           struct group   *grp;
           struct tm      *tm;
           char            datestring[256];
           ...
           /* Loop through directory entries. */
           while ((dp = readdir(dir)) != NULL) {
               /* Get entry's information. */
               if (stat(dp->d_name, &statbuf) == -1)
                   continue;
               /* Print out type, permissions, and number of links. */
               printf("%10.10s", sperm (statbuf.st_mode));
               printf("%4d", statbuf.st_nlink);
               /* Print out owner's name if it is found using getpwuid(). */
               if ((pwd = getpwuid(statbuf.st_uid)) != NULL)
                   printf(" %-8.8s", pwd->pw_name);
               else
                   printf(" %-8d", statbuf.st_uid);
               /* Print out group name if it is found using getgrgid(). */
               if ((grp = getgrgid(statbuf.st_gid)) != NULL)
                   printf(" %-8.8s", grp->gr_name);
               else
                   printf(" %-8d", statbuf.st_gid);
               /* Print size of file. */
               printf(" %9jd", (intmax_t)statbuf.st_size);
               tm = localtime(&statbuf.st_mtime);
               /* Get localized date string. */
               strftime(datestring, sizeof(datestring), nl_langinfo(D_T_FMT), tm);
               printf(" %s %s\n", datestring, dp->d_name);
           }
   Obtaining Symbolic Link Status Information
       The following example shows how to obtain status information for a
       symbolic link named /modules/pass1.  The structure variable buffer is
       defined for the stat structure. If the path argument specified the
       pathname for the file pointed to by the symbolic link
       (/home/cnd/mod1), the results of calling the function would be the
       same as those returned by a call to the stat() function.
           #include <sys/stat.h>
           struct stat buffer;
           int status;
           ...
           status = lstat("/modules/pass1", &buffer);

APPLICATION USAGE         top

       None.

RATIONALE         top

       The intent of the paragraph describing ``additional or alternate file
       access control mechanisms'' is to allow a secure implementation where
       a process with a label that does not dominate the file's label cannot
       perform a stat() function. This is not related to read permission; a
       process with a label that dominates the file's label does not need
       read permission.  An implementation that supports write-up operations
       could fail fstat() function calls even though it has a valid file
       descriptor open for writing.
       The lstat() function is not required to update the time-related
       fields if the named file is not a symbolic link. While the st_uid,
       st_gid, st_atim, st_mtim, and st_ctim members of the stat structure
       may apply to a symbolic link, they are not required to do so.  No
       functions in POSIX.1‐2008 are required to maintain any of these time
       fields.
       The purpose of the fstatat() function is to obtain the status of
       files in directories other than the current working directory without
       exposure to race conditions. Any part of the path of a file could be
       changed in parallel to a call to stat(), resulting in unspecified
       behavior. By opening a file descriptor for the target directory and
       using the fstatat() function it can be guaranteed that the file for
       which status is returned is located relative to the desired
       directory.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS         top

       None.

SEE ALSO         top

       access(3p), chmod(3p), fdopendir(3p), fstat(3p), mknod(3p),
       readlink(3p), symlink(3p)
       The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section 4.8, File Times
       Update, fcntl.h(0p), sys_stat.h(0p), sys_types.h(0p)

COPYRIGHT         top

       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2013 Edition, Standard for Information
       Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open
       Group Base Specifications Issue 7, Copyright (C) 2013 by the
       Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open
       Group.  (This is POSIX.1-2008 with the 2013 Technical Corrigendum 1
       applied.) In the event of any discrepancy between this version and
       the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and
       The Open Group Standard is the referee document. The original
       Standard can be obtained online at http://www.unix.org/online.html .
       Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page are
       most likely to have been introduced during the conversion of the
       source files to man page format. To report such errors, see
       https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .
IEEE/The Open Group                 2013                         FSTATAT(3P)

Pages that refer to this page: sys_stat.h(0p)du(1p)find(1p)ls(1p)pax(1p)access(3p)chmod(3p)fchmod(3p)fdopendir(3p)fstat(3p)ftw(3p)glob(3p)lstat(3p)mknod(3p)nftw(3p)posix_spawn(3p)readdir(3p)readlink(3p)stat(3p)symlink(3p)utime(3p)