POSIX_CLOSE(3) Library Functions Manual POSIX_CLOSE(3)

close posix_close — close a file descriptor

#include <unistd.h>

int close(int fildes);
int posix_close(int fildes, int flag);

The close () function shall deallocate the file descriptor indicated by fildes. To deallocate means to make the file descriptor available for return by subsequent calls to open(3) or other functions that allocate file descriptors. All process-owned file locks that the calling process owns on the file associated with the file descriptor shall be unlocked.

If close () is interrupted by a signal that is to be caught, then it is unspecified whether it returns -1 with errno set to [EINTR] and fildes remaining open, or returns -1 with errno set to [EINPROGRESS] and fildes being closed, or returns 0 to indicate successful completion; except that if POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART is defined as 0, then the option of returning -1 with errno set to [EINTR] and fildes remaining open shall not occur. If close () returns -1 with errno set to [EINTR], it is unspecified whether fildes can subsequently be passed to any function except close () or posix_close () without error. For all other error situations (except for [EBADF] where fildes was invalid), fildes shall be closed. If fildes was closed even though the close operation is incomplete, the close operation shall continue asynchronously and the process shall have no further ability to track the completion or final status of the close operation.

When all file descriptors associated with a pipe or FIFO special file are closed, any data remaining in the pipe or FIFO shall be discarded.

When all file descriptors associated with an open file description have been closed, the open file description shall be freed.

If the link count of the file is 0, when all file descriptors associated with the file are closed, the space occupied by the file shall be freed and the file shall no longer be accessible.

If fildes refers to the manager side of a pseudo-terminal, and this is the last close, a SIGHUP signal shall be sent to the controlling process, if any, for which the subsidiary side of the pseudo-terminal is the controlling terminal. It is unspecified whether closing the manager side of the pseudo-terminal flushes all queued input and output.

When there is an outstanding cancelable asynchronous I/O operation against fildes when close () is called, that I/O operation may be canceled. An I/O operation that is not canceled completes as if the close () operation had not yet occurred. All operations that are not canceled shall complete as if the close () blocked until the operations completed. The close () operation itself need not block awaiting such I/O completion. Whether any I/O operation is canceled, and which I/O operation may be canceled upon close (), is implementation-defined.

If a memory mapped file [SHM] or a shared memory object remains referenced at the last close (that is, a process has it mapped), then the entire contents of the memory object shall persist until the memory object becomes unreferenced. If this is the last close of a memory mapped file [SHM] or a shared memory object and the close results in the memory object becoming unreferenced, and the memory object has been unlinked, then the memory object shall be removed.

When all file descriptors associated with a socket have been closed, the socket shall be destroyed. If the socket is in connection-mode, and the SO_LINGER option is set for the socket with non-zero linger time, and the socket has untransmitted data, then close () shall block for up to the current linger interval until all data is transmitted.

The posix_close () function shall be equivalent to the close () function, except with the modifications based on the flag argument as described below. If flag is 0, then posix_close () shall not return -1 with errno set to [EINTR], which implies that fildes will always be closed (except for [EBADF], where fildes was invalid). If flag includes POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART and POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART is defined as a non-zero value, and posix_close () is interrupted by a signal that is to be caught, then posix_close () may return -1 with errno set to [EINTR], in which case fildes shall be left open; however, it is unspecified whether fildes can subsequently be passed to any function except close () or posix_close () without error. If flag is invalid, posix_close () may fail with errno set to [EINVAL], but shall otherwise behave as if flag had been 0 and close fildes.

Upon successful completion, 0 shall be returned; otherwise, -1 shall be returned and errno set to indicate the error.

The close () and posix_close () functions shall fail if:

The fildes argument is not a open file descriptor.
The function was interrupted by a signal and fildes was closed but the close operation is continuing asynchronously.

The close () and posix_close () functions may fail if:

The function was interrupted by a signal, POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART is defined as non-zero, and (in the case of posix_close ()) the flag argument included POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART, in which case fildes is still open.
An I/O error occurred while reading from or writing to the file system.

The posix_close () function may fail if:

The value of the flag argument is invalid.

The close () and posix_close () functions shall not return an [EAGAIN] or [EWOULDBLOCK] error. If POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART is zero, the close () function shall not return an [EINTR] error. The posix_close () function shall not return an [EINTR] error unless flag includes a non-zero POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART.

The following example closes the file descriptor associated with standard output for the current process, re-assigns standard output to a new file descriptor, and closes the original file descriptor to clean up. This example assumes that the file descriptor 0 (which is the descriptor for standard input) is not closed.

#include <unistd.h>
...
int pfd;
...
close(1);
dup(pfd);
close(pfd);
...

Incidentally, this is exactly what could be achieved using:

dup2(pfd, 1);
close(pfd);

In the following example, close () is used to close a file descriptor after an unsuccessful attempt is made to associate that file descriptor with a stream.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <stdlib.h>


#define LOCKFILE "/etc/ptmp"
...
int pfd;
FILE *fpfd;
...
if ((fpfd = fdopen (pfd, "w")) == NULL) {
    close(pfd);
    unlink(LOCKFILE);
    exit(1);
}
...

An application that had used the routine fopen(3) to open a file should use the corresponding fclose(3) routine rather than close (). Once a file is closed, the file descriptor no longer exists, since the integer corresponding to it no longer refers to a file.

Implementations may use file descriptors that must be inherited into child processes for the child process to remain conforming, such as for message catalog or tracing purposes. Therefore, an application that calls close () on an arbitrary integer risks non-conforming behavior, and close () can only portably be used on file descriptor values that the application has obtained through explicit actions, as well as the three file descriptors corresponding to the standard file streams. In multi-threaded parent applications, the practice of calling close () in a loop after fork(3) and before an exec call in order to avoid a race condition of leaking an unintended file descriptor into a child process, is therefore unsafe, and the race should instead be combatted by opening all file descriptors with the FD_CLOEXEC bit set unless the file descriptor is intended to be inherited across exec.

Usage of close () on file descriptors STDIN_FILENO, STDOUT_FILENO, or STDERR_FILENO should immediately be followed by an operation to reopen these file descriptors. Unexpected behavior will result if any of these file descriptors is left in a closed state (for example, an [EBADF] error from perror(3)) or if an unrelated open(3) or similar call later in the application accidentally allocates a file to one of these well-known file descriptors. Furthermore, a close () followed by a reopen operation (e.g., open(3), dup(3), etc.) is not atomic; dup2(3) should be used to change standard file descriptors.

The use of interruptible device close routines should be discouraged to avoid problems with the implicit closes of file descriptors, such as by exec, process termination, or dup2(3). This volume of POSIX.1-2024 only intends to permit such behavior by specifying the [EINTR] error condition for close () and posix_close () with non-zero POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART, to allow applications a portable way to resume waiting for an event associated with the close operation (for example, a tape drive rewinding) after receiving an interrupt. This standard also permits implementations to define POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART to 0 if they do not choose to provide a way to restart an interrupted close action. Although the file descriptor is left open on [EINTR], it might no longer be usable; that is, passing it to any function except close () or posix_close () might result in an error such as [EIO]. If an application must guarantee that data will not be lost, it is recommended that the application use fsync(3) or fdatasync(3) prior to the close operation, rather than leaving the close operation to deal with pending I/O and risk an interrupt.

Earlier versions of this standard left the state of fildes unspecified after errors such as [EINTR] and [EIO]; and implementations differed on whether close () left fildes open after [EINTR]. This was unsatisfactory once threads were introduced, since multi-threaded applications need to know whether fildes has been closed. Applications cannot blindly call close () again, because if fildes was closed by the first call another thread could have been allocated a file descriptor with the same value as fildes, which must not be closed by the first thread. On the other hand, the alternative of never retrying close () would lead to a file descriptor leak in implementations where close () did not close fildes, although such a leak may be harmless if the process is about to exit or the file descriptor is marked FD_CLOEXEC and the process is about to be replaced by exec. This standard introduced posix_close () with a flag argument that allows a choice between the two possible error behaviors, and leaves it unspecified which of the two behaviors is implemented by close () (although it is guaranteed to be one of the two behaviors of posix_close (), rather than leaving things completely unspecified as in earlier versions of the standard).

Note that the standard requires that close () and posix_close () must leave fildes open after [EINTR] (in the cases where [EINTR] is permitted) and must close the file descriptor regardless of all other errors (except [EBADF], where fildes is already invalid). In general, portable applications should only retry a close () after checking for [EINTR] (and on implementations where POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART is defined to be zero, this retry loop will be dead code), and risk a file descriptor leak if a retry loop is not attempted. It should also be noted that [EINTR] is only possible if close () can be interrupted; if no signal handlers are installed, then close () will not be interrupted. Conversely, if a single-threaded application can guarantee that no file descriptors are opened or closed in signal handlers, then a retry loop without checking for [EINTR] will be harmless (since the retry will fail with [EBADF]), but guaranteeing that no external libraries introduce the use of threading can be difficult. There are additional guarantees for applications which will only ever be used on systems where POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART is defined as 0. These observations should help in determining whether an application needs to have its close () calls audited for replacement with posix_close ().

It should also be noted that the requirement for posix_close () with a flag of 0 to always close fildes, even if an error is reported, is similar to the requirements on fclose(3) to always release the stream, even if an error is encountered while flushing data.

Implementations that previously always closed fildes can meet the new requirements by translating [EINTR] to [EINPROGRESS] in close (); and may define POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART to 0 rather than having to add restart semantics. On the other hand, implementations that previously left fildes open on [EINTR] can map that to posix_close () with POSIX_CLOSE_RESTART, and must add the semantics of posix_close () when flag is 0; one possibility is by calling the original close () implementation, checking for failure, and on [EINTR], using actions similar to dup2(3) to replace the incomplete close operation with another file descriptor that can be closed immediately by another call to the original close (), all before returning to the application. Either way, close () should always map to one of the two behaviors of posix_close (), and implementations are encouraged to keep the behavior of close () unchanged so as not to break implementation-specific expectations of older applications that were relying on behavior not specified by older versions of this standard.

The standard developers considered introducing a thread-local variable that close () would set to indicate whether it had closed fildes when returning -1. However, this was rejected in favor of the simpler solution of tightening close () to guarantee that fildes is closed except for [EINTR], and exposing a choice of whether to expect [EINTR] by adding posix_close (). Additionally, while the name posix_close () is new to this standard, it is reminiscent of at least one implementation that introduced an alternate system call named () in order to allow an application to choose whether restart semantics were desired.

Another consideration was whether implementations might return [EAGAIN] as an extension and whether close () should be required to leave the file descriptor open in this case, since [EAGAIN] normally implies an operation should be retried. It seemed very unlikely that any implementation would have a legitimate reason to return [EAGAIN] or [EWOULDBLOCK], and therefore this requirement would mean applications have to include code for an error case that will never be used. Therefore close () is now forbidden from returning [EAGAIN] and [EWOULDBLOCK] errors.

Note that the requirement for close () on a socket to block for up to the current linger interval is not conditional on the O_NONBLOCK setting.

The standard developers rejected a proposal to add () to the standard. Because the standard permits implementations to use inherited file descriptors as a means of providing a conforming environment for the child process, it is not possible to standardize an interface that closes arbitrary file descriptors above a certain value while still guaranteeing a conforming environment.

None.

dup(3), exec(3), exit(3), fclose(3), fopen(3), fork(3), open(3), perror(3), unlink(3)

XBD <unistd.h>

First released in Issue 1. Derived from Issue 1 of the SVID.

The DESCRIPTION is updated for alignment with the POSIX Realtime Extension.

The DESCRIPTION related to a STREAMS-based file or pseudo-terminal is marked as part of the XSI STREAMS Option Group.

The following new requirements on POSIX implementations derive from alignment with the Single UNIX Specification:

  • The [EIO] error condition is added as an optional error.
  • The DESCRIPTION is updated to describe the state of the fildes file descriptor as unspecified if an I/O error occurs and an [EIO] error condition is returned.

Text referring to sockets is added to the DESCRIPTION.

The DESCRIPTION is updated for alignment with IEEE Std 1003.1j-2000 by specifying that shared memory objects and memory mapped files (and not typed memory objects) are the types of memory objects to which the paragraph on last closes applies.

IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 (“POSIX.1”)/Cor 1-2002, item XSH/TC1/D6/12 is applied, correcting the XSH shaded text relating to the manager side of a pseudo-terminal. The reason for the change is that the behavior of pseudo-terminals and regular terminals should be as much alike as possible in this case; the change achieves that and matches historical behavior.

Functionality relating to the XSI STREAMS option is marked obsolescent.

Functionality relating to the Asynchronous Input and Output and Memory Mapped Files options is moved to the Base.

Austin Group Interpretation 1003.1-2001 #139 is applied, clarifying that the requirement for close () on a socket to block for up to the current linger interval is not conditional on the O_NONBLOCK setting.

POSIX.1-2008, Technical Corrigendum 1, XSH/TC1-2008/0059 [419], XSH/TC1-2008/0060 [149], and XSH/TC1-2008/0061 [149] are applied.

POSIX.1-2008, Technical Corrigendum 2, XSH/TC2-2008/0069 [555] is applied.

Austin Group Defect 529 is applied, adding the posix_close () function and changing requirements for the close () function relating to [EINTR].

Austin Group Defect 768 is applied, adding OFD-owned file locks.

Austin Group Defect 1330 is applied, removing obsolescent interfaces.

Austin Group Defect 1466 is applied, changing the terminology used for pseudo-terminal devices.

Austin Group Defect 1525 is applied, clarifying that a socket is not destroyed until all file descriptors associated with it have been closed.

June 14, 2024 posix.fail