Name

readlink - read value of a symbolic link

Synopsis

#include <unistd.h>

int
readlink(const char *path, char *buf, int bufsiz);

Description

Readlink() places the contents of the symbolic link path in the buffer buf, which has size bufsiz. Readlink does not append a NUL character to buf.

Return Values

The call returns the count of characters placed in the buffer if it succeeds, or a -1 if an error occurs, placing the error code in the global variable errno.

Errors

Readlink() will fail if:

[ENOTDIR]

A component of the path prefix is not a directory.

[ENAMETOOLONG]

A component of a pathname exceeded {NAME_MAX} characters, or an entire path name exceeded {PATH_MAX} characters.

[ENOENT]

The named file does not exist.

[EACCES]

Search permission is denied for a component of the path prefix.

[ELOOP]

Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.

[EINVAL]

The named file is not a symbolic link.

[EIO]

An I/O error occurred while reading from the file system.

[EFAULT]

Buf extends outside the process's allocated address space.

See Also

stat(2) , lstat(2) , symlink(2) symlink(7) ,

History

The readlink() function call appeared in 4.2BSD.

Table of Contents

• Name
• Synopsis
• Description
• Return Values
• Errors
• See Also
• History