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SIGACTION(3P) POSIX Programmer's Manual SIGACTION(3P)
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.
sigaction — examine and change a signal action
#include <signal.h>
int sigaction(int sig, const struct sigaction *restrict act,
struct sigaction *restrict oact);
The sigaction() function allows the calling process to examine and/or
specify the action to be associated with a specific signal. The
argument sig specifies the signal; acceptable values are defined in
<signal.h>.
The structure sigaction, used to describe an action to be taken, is
defined in the <signal.h> header to include at least the following
members:
┌────────────────┬───────────────┬───────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Member Type │ Member Name │ Description │
├────────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────────────────────────────┤
│void(*) (int) │ sa_handler │Pointer to a signal-catching function │
│ │ │or one of the macros SIG_IGN or │
│ │ │SIG_DFL. │
│sigset_t │ sa_mask │Additional set of signals to be │
│ │ │blocked during execution of signal- │
│ │ │catching function. │
│int │ sa_flags │Special flags to affect behavior of │
│ │ │signal. │
│void(*) (int, │ sa_sigaction │Pointer to a signal-catching function. │
│ siginfo_t *, │ │ │
│void *) │ │ │
└────────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────────────────────────────┘
The storage occupied by sa_handler and sa_sigaction may overlap, and
a conforming application shall not use both simultaneously.
If the argument act is not a null pointer, it points to a structure
specifying the action to be associated with the specified signal. If
the argument oact is not a null pointer, the action previously
associated with the signal is stored in the location pointed to by
the argument oact. If the argument act is a null pointer, signal
handling is unchanged; thus, the call can be used to enquire about
the current handling of a given signal. The SIGKILL and SIGSTOP
signals shall not be added to the signal mask using this mechanism;
this restriction shall be enforced by the system without causing an
error to be indicated.
If the SA_SIGINFO flag (see below) is cleared in the sa_flags field
of the sigaction structure, the sa_handler field identifies the
action to be associated with the specified signal. If the SA_SIGINFO
flag is set in the sa_flags field, the sa_sigaction field specifies a
signal-catching function.
The sa_flags field can be used to modify the behavior of the
specified signal.
The following flags, defined in the <signal.h> header, can be set in
sa_flags:
SA_NOCLDSTOP Do not generate SIGCHLD when children stop or stopped
children continue.
If sig is SIGCHLD and the SA_NOCLDSTOP flag is not set
in sa_flags, and the implementation supports the
SIGCHLD signal, then a SIGCHLD signal shall be
generated for the calling process whenever any of its
child processes stop and a SIGCHLD signal may be
generated for the calling process whenever any of its
stopped child processes are continued. If sig is
SIGCHLD and the SA_NOCLDSTOP flag is set in sa_flags,
then the implementation shall not generate a SIGCHLD
signal in this way.
SA_ONSTACK If set and an alternate signal stack has been declared
with sigaltstack(), the signal shall be delivered to
the calling process on that stack. Otherwise, the
signal shall be delivered on the current stack.
SA_RESETHAND If set, the disposition of the signal shall be reset to
SIG_DFL and the SA_SIGINFO flag shall be cleared on
entry to the signal handler.
Note: SIGILL and SIGTRAP cannot be automatically
reset when delivered; the system silently
enforces this restriction.
Otherwise, the disposition of the signal shall not be
modified on entry to the signal handler.
In addition, if this flag is set, sigaction() may
behave as if the SA_NODEFER flag were also set.
SA_RESTART This flag affects the behavior of interruptible
functions; that is, those specified to fail with errno
set to [EINTR]. If set, and a function specified as
interruptible is interrupted by this signal, the
function shall restart and shall not fail with [EINTR]
unless otherwise specified. If an interruptible
function which uses a timeout is restarted, the
duration of the timeout following the restart is set to
an unspecified value that does not exceed the original
timeout value. If the flag is not set, interruptible
functions interrupted by this signal shall fail with
errno set to [EINTR].
SA_SIGINFO If cleared and the signal is caught, the signal-
catching function shall be entered as:
void func(int signo);
where signo is the only argument to the signal-catching
function. In this case, the application shall use the
sa_handler member to describe the signal-catching
function and the application shall not modify the
sa_sigaction member.
If SA_SIGINFO is set and the signal is caught, the
signal-catching function shall be entered as:
void func(int signo, siginfo_t *info, void *context);
where two additional arguments are passed to the
signal-catching function. The second argument shall
point to an object of type siginfo_t explaining the
reason why the signal was generated; the third argument
can be cast to a pointer to an object of type
ucontext_t to refer to the receiving thread's context
that was interrupted when the signal was delivered. In
this case, the application shall use the sa_sigaction
member to describe the signal-catching function and the
application shall not modify the sa_handler member.
The si_signo member contains the system-generated
signal number.
The si_errno member may contain implementation-defined
additional error information; if non-zero, it contains
an error number identifying the condition that caused
the signal to be generated.
The si_code member contains a code identifying the
cause of the signal, as described in Section 2.4.3,
Signal Actions.
SA_NOCLDWAIT If set, and sig equals SIGCHLD, child processes of the
calling processes shall not be transformed into zombie
processes when they terminate. If the calling process
subsequently waits for its children, and the process
has no unwaited-for children that were transformed into
zombie processes, it shall block until all of its
children terminate, and wait(), waitid(), and waitpid()
shall fail and set errno to [ECHILD]. Otherwise,
terminating child processes shall be transformed into
zombie processes, unless SIGCHLD is set to SIG_IGN.
SA_NODEFER If set and sig is caught, sig shall not be added to the
thread's signal mask on entry to the signal handler
unless it is included in sa_mask. Otherwise, sig shall
always be added to the thread's signal mask on entry to
the signal handler.
When a signal is caught by a signal-catching function installed by
sigaction(), a new signal mask is calculated and installed for the
duration of the signal-catching function (or until a call to either
sigprocmask() or sigsuspend() is made). This mask is formed by taking
the union of the current signal mask and the value of the sa_mask for
the signal being delivered, and unless SA_NODEFER or SA_RESETHAND is
set, then including the signal being delivered. If and when the
user's signal handler returns normally, the original signal mask is
restored.
Once an action is installed for a specific signal, it shall remain
installed until another action is explicitly requested (by another
call to sigaction()), until the SA_RESETHAND flag causes resetting of
the handler, or until one of the exec functions is called.
If the previous action for sig had been established by signal(), the
values of the fields returned in the structure pointed to by oact are
unspecified, and in particular oact->sa_handler is not necessarily
the same value passed to signal(). However, if a pointer to the same
structure or a copy thereof is passed to a subsequent call to
sigaction() via the act argument, handling of the signal shall be as
if the original call to signal() were repeated.
If sigaction() fails, no new signal handler is installed.
It is unspecified whether an attempt to set the action for a signal
that cannot be caught or ignored to SIG_DFL is ignored or causes an
error to be returned with errno set to [EINVAL].
If SA_SIGINFO is not set in sa_flags, then the disposition of
subsequent occurrences of sig when it is already pending is
implementation-defined; the signal-catching function shall be invoked
with a single argument. If SA_SIGINFO is set in sa_flags, then
subsequent occurrences of sig generated by sigqueue() or as a result
of any signal-generating function that supports the specification of
an application-defined value (when sig is already pending) shall be
queued in FIFO order until delivered or accepted; the signal-catching
function shall be invoked with three arguments. The application
specified value is passed to the signal-catching function as the
si_value member of the siginfo_t structure.
The result of the use of sigaction() and a sigwait() function
concurrently within a process on the same signal is unspecified.
Upon successful completion, sigaction() shall return 0; otherwise, −1
shall be returned, errno shall be set to indicate the error, and no
new signal-catching function shall be installed.
The sigaction() function shall fail if:
EINVAL The sig argument is not a valid signal number or an attempt is
made to catch a signal that cannot be caught or ignore a
signal that cannot be ignored.
ENOTSUP
The SA_SIGINFO bit flag is set in the sa_flags field of the
sigaction structure.
The sigaction() function may fail if:
EINVAL An attempt was made to set the action to SIG_DFL for a signal
that cannot be caught or ignored (or both).
In addition, the sigaction() function may fail if the SA_SIGINFO flag
is set in the sa_flags field of the sigaction structure for a signal
not in the range SIGRTMIN to SIGRTMAX.
The following sections are informative.
Establishing a Signal Handler
The following example demonstrates the use of sigaction() to
establish a handler for the SIGINT signal.
#include <signal.h>
static void handler(int signum)
{
/* Take appropriate actions for signal delivery */
}
int main()
{
struct sigaction sa;
sa.sa_handler = handler;
sigemptyset(&sa.sa_mask);
sa.sa_flags = SA_RESTART; /* Restart functions if
interrupted by handler */
if (sigaction(SIGINT, &sa, NULL) == −1)
/* Handle error */;
/* Further code */
}
The sigaction() function supersedes the signal() function, and should
be used in preference. In particular, sigaction() and signal() should
not be used in the same process to control the same signal. The
behavior of async-signal-safe functions, as defined in their
respective DESCRIPTION sections, is as specified by this volume of
POSIX.1‐2008, regardless of invocation from a signal-catching
function. This is the only intended meaning of the statement that
async-signal-safe functions may be used in signal-catching functions
without restrictions. Applications must still consider all effects of
such functions on such things as data structures, files, and process
state. In particular, application developers need to consider the
restrictions on interactions when interrupting sleep() and
interactions among multiple handles for a file description. The fact
that any specific function is listed as async-signal-safe does not
necessarily mean that invocation of that function from a signal-
catching function is recommended.
In order to prevent errors arising from interrupting non-async-
signal-safe function calls, applications should protect calls to
these functions either by blocking the appropriate signals or through
the use of some programmatic semaphore (see semget(3p), sem_init(3p),
sem_open(3p), and so on). Note in particular that even the ``safe''
functions may modify errno; the signal-catching function, if not
executing as an independent thread, should save and restore its value
in order to avoid the possibility that delivery of a signal in
between an error return from a function that sets errno and the
subsequent examination of errno could result in the signal-catching
function changing the value of errno. Naturally, the same principles
apply to the async-signal-safety of application routines and
asynchronous data access. Note that longjmp() and siglongjmp() are
not in the list of async-signal-safe functions. This is because the
code executing after longjmp() and siglongjmp() can call any unsafe
functions with the same danger as calling those unsafe functions
directly from the signal handler. Applications that use longjmp() and
siglongjmp() from within signal handlers require rigorous protection
in order to be portable. Many of the other functions that are
excluded from the list are traditionally implemented using either
malloc() or free() functions or the standard I/O library, both of
which traditionally use data structures in a non-async-signal-safe
manner. Since any combination of different functions using a common
data structure can cause async-signal-safety problems, this volume of
POSIX.1‐2008 does not define the behavior when any unsafe function is
called in a signal handler that interrupts an unsafe function.
Usually, the signal is executed on the stack that was in effect
before the signal was delivered. An alternate stack may be specified
to receive a subset of the signals being caught.
When the signal handler returns, the receiving thread resumes
execution at the point it was interrupted unless the signal handler
makes other arrangements. If longjmp() or _longjmp() is used to leave
the signal handler, then the signal mask must be explicitly restored.
This volume of POSIX.1‐2008 defines the third argument of a signal
handling function when SA_SIGINFO is set as a void * instead of a
ucontext_t *, but without requiring type checking. New applications
should explicitly cast the third argument of the signal handling
function to ucontext_t *.
The BSD optional four argument signal handling function is not
supported by this volume of POSIX.1‐2008. The BSD declaration would
be:
void handler(int sig, int code, struct sigcontext *scp,
char *addr);
where sig is the signal number, code is additional information on
certain signals, scp is a pointer to the sigcontext structure, and
addr is additional address information. Much the same information is
available in the objects pointed to by the second argument of the
signal handler specified when SA_SIGINFO is set.
Since the sigaction() function is allowed but not required to set
SA_NODEFER when the application sets the SA_RESETHAND flag,
applications which depend on the SA_RESETHAND functionality for the
newly installed signal handler must always explicitly set SA_NODEFER
when they set SA_RESETHAND in order to be portable.
See also the rationale for Realtime Signal Generation and Delivery in
the Rationale (Informative) volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section B.2.4.2,
Signal Generation and Delivery.
Although this volume of POSIX.1‐2008 requires that signals that
cannot be ignored shall not be added to the signal mask when a
signal-catching function is entered, there is no explicit requirement
that subsequent calls to sigaction() reflect this in the information
returned in the oact argument. In other words, if SIGKILL is included
in the sa_mask field of act, it is unspecified whether or not a
subsequent call to sigaction() returns with SIGKILL included in the
sa_mask field of oact.
The SA_NOCLDSTOP flag, when supplied in the act->sa_flags parameter,
allows overloading SIGCHLD with the System V semantics that each
SIGCLD signal indicates a single terminated child. Most conforming
applications that catch SIGCHLD are expected to install signal-
catching functions that repeatedly call the waitpid() function with
the WNOHANG flag set, acting on each child for which status is
returned, until waitpid() returns zero. If stopped children are not
of interest, the use of the SA_NOCLDSTOP flag can prevent the
overhead from invoking the signal-catching routine when they stop.
Some historical implementations also define other mechanisms for
stopping processes, such as the ptrace() function. These
implementations usually do not generate a SIGCHLD signal when
processes stop due to this mechanism; however, that is beyond the
scope of this volume of POSIX.1‐2008.
This volume of POSIX.1‐2008 requires that calls to sigaction() that
supply a NULL act argument succeed, even in the case of signals that
cannot be caught or ignored (that is, SIGKILL or SIGSTOP). The
System V signal() and BSD sigvec() functions return [EINVAL] in these
cases and, in this respect, their behavior varies from sigaction().
This volume of POSIX.1‐2008 requires that sigaction() properly save
and restore a signal action set up by the ISO C standard signal()
function. However, there is no guarantee that the reverse is true,
nor could there be given the greater amount of information conveyed
by the sigaction structure. Because of this, applications should
avoid using both functions for the same signal in the same process.
Since this cannot always be avoided in case of general-purpose
library routines, they should always be implemented with sigaction().
It was intended that the signal() function should be implementable as
a library routine using sigaction().
The POSIX Realtime Extension extends the sigaction() function as
specified by the POSIX.1‐1990 standard to allow the application to
request on a per-signal basis via an additional signal action flag
that the extra parameters, including the application-defined signal
value, if any, be passed to the signal-catching function.
None.
Section 2.4, Signal Concepts, exec(1p), kill(3p), _longjmp(3p),
longjmp(3p), pthread_sigmask(3p), raise(3p), semget(3p),
sem_init(3p), sem_open(3p), sigaddset(3p), sigaltstack(3p),
sigdelset(3p), sigemptyset(3p), sigfillset(3p), sigismember(3p),
signal(3p), sigsuspend(3p), wait(3p), waitid(3p)
The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, signal.h(0p)
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 SIGACTION(3P)
Pages that refer to this page: signal.h(0p), alarm(3p), exec(3p), fcntl(3p), getrusage(3p), ioctl(3p), kill(3p), longjmp(3p), msgrcv(3p), msgsnd(3p), pthread_sigmask(3p), raise(3p), semop(3p), sigaddset(3p), sigaltstack(3p), sigdelset(3p), sigemptyset(3p), sigfillset(3p), sighold(3p), siginterrupt(3p), sigismember(3p), signal(3p), sigsuspend(3p), sigtimedwait(3p), sigwait(3p), sleep(3p)