rename(2POSIX)

NAME | SYNOPSIS | FEATURES | DESCRIPTION | CAVEAT | RETURN VALUES | ERRORS | ATTRIBUTES | SEE ALSO

NAME

rename- change the name of a file

SYNOPSIS

#include <stdio.h>

int rename(const char *from, const char *to);

FEATURES

MSDOSFS, NFS_CLIENT, UFS

DESCRIPTION

The rename system call causes the link named from to be renamed as to. If to exists, it is first removed. Both from and to must be of the same type (that is, both directories or both non-directories), and must reside on the same file system.

The rename system call guarantees that an instance of to will always exist, even if the system should crash in the middle of the operation.

If the final component of from is a symbolic link, the symbolic link is renamed, not the file or directory to which it points.

CAVEAT

The system can deadlock if a loop in the file system graph is present. This loop takes the form of an entry in directory a,for example, a/foo, being a hard link to directory b, and an entry in directory b, for example,b/bar, being a hard link to directory a. When this type of loop exists and two separate processes attempt to perform rename a/foo b/bar and rename b/bar a/foo, respectively, the system may deadlock while attempting to lock both directories for modification. Hard links to directories should be replaced by symbolic links by the system administrator.

RETURN VALUES

If successful, rename returns a value of 0, otherwise a value of -1 is returned, and the global variable errno is set to indicate one of the following error conditions.

ERRORS

[ENAMETOOLONG]

A component of either pathname exceeded 255 characters, or the entire length of either pathname exceeded 1023 characters.

[ENOENT]

A component of the from path does not exist, or a path prefix of to does not exist.

[EACCES]

A component of either path prefix denies search permission.

[EACCES]

The requested link requires writing to a directory with a mode that denies write permission.

[EPERM]

The directory containing from is marked sticky, and neither the containing directory nor from are owned by the effective user ID.

[EPERM]

The file exists, the directory containing to is marked sticky, and neither the containing directory nor to are owned by the effective user ID.

[ELOOP]

Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating either pathname.

[ENOTDIR]

A component of either path prefix is not a directory.

[ENOTDIR]

from is a directory, but to is not a directory.

[EISDIR]

to is a directory, but from is not a directory.

[EXDEV]

The link named by to and the file named by from are on different logical devices (file systems). Note that this error code will not be returned if the implementation permits cross-device links.

[ENOSPC]

The directory in which the entry for the new name is being placed cannot be extended because there is no space left on the file system containing the directory.

[EIO]

An I/O error occurred while making or updating a directory entry.

[EROFS]

The requested link requires writing to a directory on a read-only file system.

[EFAULT]

from or to point outside the process' allocated address space.

[EINVAL]

from is a parent directory of to, or an attempt has been made to rename.

[EEXIST]

To is a directory and is not empty.

ATTRIBUTES

See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:

ATTRIBUTE TYPE	ATTRIBUTE VALUE
Interface Stability	Evolving

SEE ALSO

open(2POSIX)

ChorusOS 4.0  Last Revised December 1999

NAME | SYNOPSIS | FEATURES | DESCRIPTION | CAVEAT | RETURN VALUES | ERRORS | ATTRIBUTES | SEE ALSO