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



NAME
       readlink - read value of a symbolic link

SYNOPSIS
       #include <unistd.h>

       ssize_t readlink(const char *path, char *buf, size_t bufsiz);

   Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see feature_test_macros(7)):

       readlink(): _BSD_SOURCE || _XOPEN_SOURCE >= 500 || _POSIX_C_SOURCE >= 200112L

DESCRIPTION
       readlink()  places  the contents of the symbolic link path in the buffer buf, which has size bufsiz.  readlink() does not
       append a null byte to buf.  It will truncate the contents (to a length of bufsiz characters), in case the buffer  is  too
       small to hold all of the contents.

RETURN VALUE
       On  success, readlink() returns the number of bytes placed in buf.  On error, -1 is returned and errno is set to indicate
       the error.

ERRORS
       EACCES Search permission is denied for a component of the path prefix.  (See also path_resolution(7).)

       EFAULT buf extends outside the process's allocated address space.

       EINVAL bufsiz is not positive.

       EINVAL The named file is not a symbolic link.

       EIO    An I/O error occurred while reading from the file system.

       ELOOP  Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.

       ENAMETOOLONG
              A pathname, or a component of a pathname, was too long.

       ENOENT The named file does not exist.

       ENOMEM Insufficient kernel memory was available.

       ENOTDIR
              A component of the path prefix is not a directory.

CONFORMING TO
       4.4BSD (the readlink() function call appeared in 4.2BSD), POSIX.1-2001.

NOTES
       In versions of glibc up to and including glibc 2.4, the return type of readlink() was declared  as  int.   Nowadays,  the
       return type is declared as ssize_t, as (newly) required in POSIX.1-2001.

SEE ALSO
       lstat(2), readlinkat(2), stat(2), symlink(2), path_resolution(7), symlink(7)

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                                                      2007-07-26                                                READLINK(2)