_SYSCALL(2)                                         Linux Programmer's Manual                                        _SYSCALL(2)



NAME
       _syscall - invoking a system call without library support (OBSOLETE)

SYNOPSIS
       #include <linux/unistd.h>

       A _syscall macro

       desired system call

DESCRIPTION
       The  important thing to know about a system call is its prototype.  You need to know how many arguments, their types, and
       the function return type.  There are seven macros that make the actual call into the system easier.  They have the form:

              _syscallX(type,name,type1,arg1,type2,arg2,...)

       where

              X is 0-6, which are the number of arguments taken by the system call

              type is the return type of the system call

              name is the name of the system call

              typeN is the Nth argument's type

              argN is the name of the Nth argument

       These macros create a function called name with the arguments you specify.  Once  you  include  the  _syscall()  in  your
       source file, you call the system call by name.

FILES
       /usr/include/linux/unistd.h

CONFORMING TO
       The use of these macros is Linux-specific, and deprecated.

NOTES
       Starting around kernel 2.6.18, the _syscall macros were removed from header files supplied to user space.  Use syscall(2)
       instead.  (Some architectures, notably ia64, never provided the _syscall macros; on those architectures,  syscall(2)  was
       always required.)

       The _syscall() macros do not produce a prototype.  You may have to create one, especially for C++ users.

       System  calls  are  not required to return only positive or negative error codes.  You need to read the source to be sure
       how it will return errors.  Usually, it is the negative of a standard error code, for example,  -EPERM.   The  _syscall()
       macros  will  return the result r of the system call when r is nonnegative, but will return -1 and set the variable errno
       to -r when r is negative.  For the error codes, see errno(3).

       When defining a system call, the argument types must be passed by-value or by-pointer (for aggregates like structs).

EXAMPLE
       #include <stdio.h>
       #include <stdlib.h>
       #include <errno.h>
       #include <linux/unistd.h>       /* for _syscallX macros/related stuff */
       #include <linux/kernel.h>       /* for struct sysinfo */

       _syscall1(int, sysinfo, struct sysinfo *, info);

       /* Note: if you copy directly from the nroff source, remember to
       REMOVE the extra backslashes in the printf statement. */

       int
       main(void)
       {
           struct sysinfo s_info;
           int error;

           error = sysinfo(&s_info);
           printf("code error = %d\n", error);
           printf("Uptime = %lds\nLoad: 1 min %lu / 5 min %lu / 15 min %lu\n"
                  "RAM: total %lu / free %lu / shared %lu\n"
                  "Memory in buffers = %lu\nSwap: total %lu / free %lu\n"
                  "Number of processes = %d\n",
                  s_info.uptime, s_info.loads[0],
                  s_info.loads[1], s_info.loads[2],
                  s_info.totalram, s_info.freeram,
                  s_info.sharedram, s_info.bufferram,
                  s_info.totalswap, s_info.freeswap,
                  s_info.procs);
           exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
       }

   Sample Output
       code error = 0
       uptime = 502034s
       Load: 1 min 13376 / 5 min 5504 / 15 min 1152
       RAM: total 15343616 / free 827392 / shared 8237056
       Memory in buffers = 5066752
       Swap: total 27881472 / free 24698880
       Number of processes = 40

SEE ALSO
       intro(2), syscall(2), errno(3)

COLOPHON
       This page is part of release 3.25 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/.



Linux                                                      2007-12-19                                                _SYSCALL(2)