PTSNAME

Section: Linux Programmer's Manual (3)
Updated: 2008-09-03
Index Return to Main Contents
 

NAME

ptsname, ptsname_r - get the name of the slave pseudo-terminal  

SYNOPSIS

#define _XOPEN_SOURCE

#include <stdlib.h> char *ptsname(int fd); #define _GNU_SOURCE
#include <stdlib.h> int ptsname_r(int fd, char *buf, size_t buflen);
 

DESCRIPTION

The ptsname() function returns the name of the slave pseudo-terminal (pty) device corresponding to the master referred to by fd.

The ptsname_r() function is the reentrant equivalent of ptsname(). It returns the name of the slave pseudo-terminal device as a null-terminated string in the buffer pointed to by buf. The buflen argument specifies the number of bytes available in buf.  

RETURN VALUE

On success, ptsname() returns a pointer to a string in static storage which will be overwritten by subsequent calls. This pointer must not be freed. On failure, a NULL pointer is returned.

On success, ptsname_r() returns 0. On failure, a non-zero value is returned and errno is set to indicate the error.  

ERRORS

EINVAL
(ptsname_r() only) buf is NULL.
ENOTTY
fd does not refer to a pseudo-terminal master device.
ERANGE
(ptsname_r() only) buf is too small.
 

VERSIONS

ptsname() is provided in glibc since version 2.1.  

CONFORMING TO

ptsname() is part of the Unix98 pseudo-terminal support (see pts(4)). This function is specified in POSIX.1-2001.

ptsname_r() is a Linux extension. A version of this function is documented on Tru64 and HP-UX, but on those implementations, -1 is returned on error, with errno set to indicate the error. Avoid using this function in portable programs.  

SEE ALSO

grantpt(3), posix_openpt(3), ttyname(3), unlockpt(3), pts(4), feature_test_macros(7), pty(7)  

COLOPHON

This page is part of release 3.22 of the Linux man-pages project. A description of the project, and information about reporting bugs, can be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.