xref: /freebsd/lib/libc/stdio/fflush.3 (revision 2008043f386721d58158e37e0d7e50df8095942d)
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32.\"     @(#)fflush.3	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/4/93
33.\"
34.Dd May 1, 2020
35.Dt FFLUSH 3
36.Os
37.Sh NAME
38.Nm fflush ,
39.Nm fflush_unlocked ,
40.Nm fpurge
41.Nd flush a stream
42.Sh LIBRARY
43.Lb libc
44.Sh SYNOPSIS
45.In stdio.h
46.Ft int
47.Fn fflush "FILE *stream"
48.Ft int
49.Fn fflush_unlocked "FILE *stream"
50.Ft int
51.Fn fpurge "FILE *stream"
52.Sh DESCRIPTION
53The function
54.Fn fflush
55forces a write of all buffered data for the given output or update
56.Fa stream
57via the stream's underlying write function.
58The open status of the stream is unaffected.
59.Pp
60If the
61.Fa stream
62argument is
63.Dv NULL ,
64.Fn fflush
65flushes
66.Em all
67open output streams.
68.Pp
69The
70.Fn fflush_unlocked
71function is equivalent to
72.Fn fflush ,
73except that the caller is responsible for locking the stream with
74.Xr flockfile 3
75before calling it.
76This function may be used to avoid the overhead of locking the stream and to
77prevent races when multiple threads are operating on the same stream.
78.Pp
79The function
80.Fn fpurge
81erases any input or output buffered in the given
82.Fa stream .
83For output streams this discards any unwritten output.
84For input streams this discards any input read from the underlying object
85but not yet obtained via
86.Xr getc 3 ;
87this includes any text pushed back via
88.Xr ungetc 3 .
89.Sh RETURN VALUES
90Upon successful completion 0 is returned.
91Otherwise,
92.Dv EOF
93is returned and the global variable
94.Va errno
95is set to indicate the error.
96.Sh ERRORS
97.Bl -tag -width Er
98.It Bq Er EBADF
99The
100.Fa stream
101argument
102is not an open stream.
103.El
104.Pp
105The function
106.Fn fflush
107may also fail and set
108.Va errno
109for any of the errors specified for the routine
110.Xr write 2 ,
111except that in case of
112.Fa stream
113being a read-only descriptor,
114.Fn fflush
115returns 0.
116.Sh SEE ALSO
117.Xr write 2 ,
118.Xr fclose 3 ,
119.Xr fopen 3 ,
120.Xr setbuf 3
121.Sh STANDARDS
122The
123.Fn fflush
124function
125conforms to
126.St -isoC .
127.Sh HISTORY
128The
129.Fn fflush
130function first appeared in
131.At v4 .
132The
133.Fn fpurge
134function first appeared in
135.Bx 4.4 .
136