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PTY(4)			    Kernel Interfaces Manual			PTY(4)

NAME
       pty -- old-style	compatibility pseudo-terminal driver

SYNOPSIS
       device pty

DESCRIPTION
       The  pty	 driver	provides support for the traditional BSD naming	scheme
       that was	used for accessing pseudo-terminals before it was replaced  by
       pts(4).	 This traditional naming is still used in Linux.  When the de-
       vice /dev/ptyXX is being	opened,	a new terminal shall be	 created  with
       the  pts(4)  driver.  A device node for this terminal shall be created,
       which has the name /dev/ttyXX.

       The pty driver also provides a cloning System V /dev/ptmx device.

       New code	should not try to allocate pseudo-terminals using this	inter-
       face.   It  is  only  provided for compatibility	with older C libraries
       that tried to open such devices when posix_openpt(2) was	being  called,
       and for running Linux binaries.

FILES
       The  BSD-style  compatibility pseudo-terminal driver uses the following
       device names:

       /dev/pty[l-sL-S][0-9a-v]	 Pseudo-terminal master	devices.

       /dev/tty[l-sL-S][0-9a-v]	 Pseudo-terminal slave devices.

       /dev/ptmx		 Control device, returns a file	descriptor  to
				 a new master pseudo-terminal when opened.

DIAGNOSTICS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       posix_openpt(2),	pts(4),	tty(4)

HISTORY
       A pseudo-terminal driver	appeared in 4.2BSD.

BUGS
       Unlike  previous	implementations, the master and	slave device nodes are
       destroyed when the PTY becomes unused.  A call to stat(2) on a nonexis-
       tent master device will already cause a new master device  node	to  be
       created.	  The master device can	only be	destroyed by opening and clos-
       ing it.

       The pty driver cannot be	unloaded, because it cannot determine if it is
       being used.

FreeBSD	14.3		       October 28, 2019				PTY(4)

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