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STRERROR(3)		 BSD Library Functions Manual		   STRERROR(3)

NAME
     perror, strerror, strerror_r, sys_errlist,	sys_nerr -- system error mes-
     sages

LIBRARY
     Standard C	Library	(libc, -lc)

SYNOPSIS
     #include <stdio.h>

     void
     perror(const char *string);

     extern const char * const sys_errlist[];
     extern const int sys_nerr;

     #include <string.h>

     char *
     strerror(int errnum);

     int
     strerror_r(int errnum, char *strerrbuf, size_t buflen);

DESCRIPTION
     The strerror(), strerror_r() and perror() functions look up the error
     message string corresponding to an	error number.

     The strerror() function accepts an	error number argument errnum and re-
     turns a pointer to	the corresponding message string.

     The strerror_r() function renders the same	result into strerrbuf for a
     maximum of	buflen characters and returns 0	upon success.

     The perror() function finds the error message corresponding to the	cur-
     rent value	of the global variable errno (intro(2))	and writes it, fol-
     lowed by a	newline, to the	standard error file descriptor.	 If the	argu-
     ment string is non-NULL and does not point	to the null character, this
     string is prepended to the	message	string and separated from it by	a
     colon and space (": "); otherwise,	only the error message string is
     printed.

     If	the error number is not	recognized, these functions return an error
     message string containing "Unknown	error: " followed by the error number
     in	decimal.  The strerror() and strerror_r() functions return EINVAL as a
     warning.  Error numbers recognized	by this	implementation fall in the
     range 0 < errnum <	sys_nerr.

     If	insufficient storage is	provided in strerrbuf (as specified in buflen)
     to	contain	the error string, strerror_r() returns ERANGE and strerrbuf
     will contain an error message that	has been truncated and NUL terminated
     to	fit the	length specified by buflen.

     The message strings can be	accessed directly using	the external array
     sys_errlist.  The external	value sys_nerr contains	a count	of the mes-
     sages in sys_errlist.  The	use of these variables is deprecated;
     strerror()	or strerror_r()	should be used instead.

SEE ALSO
     intro(2), psignal(3)

STANDARDS
     The perror() and strerror() functions conform to ISO/IEC 9899:1999
     ("ISO C99").  The strerror_r() function conforms to IEEE Std 1003.1-2001
     ("POSIX.1").

HISTORY
     The strerror() and	perror() functions first appeared in 4.4BSD.  The
     strerror_r() function was implemented in FreeBSD 4.4 by Wes Peters
     <wes@FreeBSD.org>.

BUGS
     For unknown error numbers,	the strerror() function	will return its	result
     in	a static buffer	which may be overwritten by subsequent calls.

     The return	type for strerror() is missing a type-qualifier; it should ac-
     tually be const char *.

     Programs that use the deprecated sys_errlist variable often fail to com-
     pile because they declare it inconsistently.

BSD			       October 12, 2004				   BSD
NAME | LIBRARY | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | SEE ALSO | STANDARDS | HISTORY | BUGS

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