IPnom Home • Manuals • FreeBSD

 FreeBSD Man Pages

Man Sections:Commands (1)System Calls (2)Library Functions (3)Device Drivers (4)File Formats (5)Miscellaneous (7)System Utilities (8)
Keyword Live Search (10 results max):
 Type in part of a command in the search box.
 


sysexits(3)

NAME

     sysexits -- preferable exit codes for programs


SYNOPSIS

     #include <sysexits.h>


DESCRIPTION

     According to style(9), it is not a good practice to call exit(3) with
     arbitrary values to indicate a failure condition when ending a program.
     Instead, the pre-defined exit codes from sysexits should be used, so the
     caller of the process can get a rough estimation about the failure class
     without looking up the source code.

     The successful exit is always indicated by a status of 0, or EX_OK.
     Error numbers begin at EX__BASE to reduce the possibility of clashing
     with other exit statuses that random programs may already return.	The
     meaning of the codes is approximately as follows:

     EX_USAGE (64)	   The command was used incorrectly, e.g., with the
			   wrong number of arguments, a bad flag, a bad syntax
			   in a parameter, or whatever.

     EX_DATAERR (65)	   The input data was incorrect in some way.  This
			   should only be used for user's data and not system
			   files.

     EX_NOINPUT (66)	   An input file (not a system file) did not exist or
			   was not readable.  This could also include errors
			   like ``No message'' to a mailer (if it cared to
			   catch it).

     EX_NOUSER (67)	   The user specified did not exist.  This might be
			   used for mail addresses or remote logins.

     EX_NOHOST (68)	   The host specified did not exist.  This is used in
			   mail addresses or network requests.

     EX_UNAVAILABLE (69)   A service is unavailable.  This can occur if a sup-
			   port program or file does not exist.  This can also
			   be used as a catchall message when something you
			   wanted to do doesn't work, but you don't know why.

     EX_SOFTWARE (70)	   An internal software error has been detected.  This
			   should be limited to non-operating system related
			   errors as possible.

     EX_OSERR (71)	   An operating system error has been detected.  This
			   is intended to be used for such things as ``cannot
			   fork'', ``cannot create pipe'', or the like.  It
			   includes things like getuid returning a user that
			   does not exist in the passwd file.

     EX_OSFILE (72)	   Some system file (e.g., /etc/passwd, /var/run/utmp,
			   etc.) does not exist, cannot be opened, or has some
			   sort of error (e.g., syntax error).

     EX_CANTCREAT (73)	   A (user specified) output file cannot be created.
     EX_PROTOCOL (76)	   The remote system returned something that was ``not
			   possible'' during a protocol exchange.

     EX_NOPERM (77)	   You did not have sufficient permission to perform
			   the operation.  This is not intended for file sys-
			   tem problems, which should use EX_NOINPUT or
			   EX_CANTCREAT, but rather for higher level permis-
			   sions.

     EX_CONFIG (78)	   Something was found in an unconfigured or miscon-
			   figured state.

     The numerical values corresponding to the symbolical ones are given in
     parenthesis for easy reference.


SEE ALSO

     exit(3), style(9)


HISTORY

     The sysexits file appeared somewhere after 4.3BSD.


AUTHORS

     This man page has been written by Jorg Wunsch after the comments in
     <sysexits.h>.


BUGS

     The choice of an appropriate exit value is often ambiguous.

FreeBSD 5.4			March 31, 1996			   FreeBSD 5.4

SPONSORED LINKS




Man(1) output converted with man2html , sed , awk