PAUSE(3P)                                           POSIX Programmer's Manual                                          PAUSE(3P)



PROLOG
       This  manual  page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux implementation of this interface may differ (con-
       sult the corresponding Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the  interface  may  not  be  implemented  on
       Linux.

NAME
       pause - suspend the thread until a signal is received

SYNOPSIS
       #include <unistd.h>

       int pause(void);


DESCRIPTION
       The pause() function shall suspend the calling thread until delivery of a signal whose action is either to execute a sig-
       nal-catching function or to terminate the process.

       If the action is to terminate the process, pause() shall not return.

       If the action is to execute a signal-catching function, pause() shall return after the signal-catching function returns.

RETURN VALUE
       Since pause() suspends thread execution indefinitely unless interrupted by a signal, there is  no  successful  completion
       return value. A value of -1 shall be returned and errno set to indicate the error.

ERRORS
       The pause() function shall fail if:

       EINTR  A signal is caught by the calling process and control is returned from the signal-catching function.


       The following sections are informative.

EXAMPLES
       None.

APPLICATION USAGE
       Many  common  uses of pause() have timing windows. The scenario involves checking a condition related to a signal and, if
       the signal has not occurred, calling pause(). When the signal occurs between the check  and  the  call  to  pause(),  the
       process  often  blocks indefinitely. The sigprocmask() and sigsuspend() functions can be used to avoid this type of prob-
       lem.

RATIONALE
       None.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       sigsuspend(), the Base Definitions volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, <unistd.h>

COPYRIGHT
       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003  Edition,  Standard  for
       Information  Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 6, Copy-
       right (C) 2001-2003 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the event of any
       discrepancy  between this version and the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group
       Standard  is  the  referee   document.   The   original   Standard   can   be   obtained   online   at   http://www.open-
       group.org/unix/online.html .



IEEE/The Open Group                                           2003                                                     PAUSE(3P)