xref: /freebsd/share/man/man9/namei.9 (revision 4232f826683298e85d469c0ef17259cecd13b2c7)
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2.\" Copyright (c) 1998, 1999 Eivind Eklund
3.\" Copyright (c) 2003 Hiten M. Pandya
4.\" Copyright (c) 2005 Robert N. M. Watson
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31.\" If you integrate this manpage in another OS, I'd appreciate a note
32.\"	- eivind@FreeBSD.org
33.\"
34.\" $FreeBSD$
35.\"
36.Dd May 6, 2015
37.Dt NAMEI 9
38.Os
39.Sh NAME
40.Nm namei ,
41.Nm NDINIT ,
42.Nm NDFREE ,
43.Nd pathname translation and lookup operations
44.Sh SYNOPSIS
45.In sys/param.h
46.In sys/fcntl.h
47.In sys/namei.h
48.Ft int
49.Fn namei "struct nameidata *ndp"
50.Ft void
51.Fo NDINIT
52.Fa "struct nameidata *ndp" "u_long op" "u_long flags"
53.Fa "enum uio_seg segflg" "const char *namep" "struct thread *td"
54.Fc
55.Ft void
56.Fn NDFREE "struct nameidata *ndp" "const uint flags"
57.Sh DESCRIPTION
58The
59.Nm
60facility allows the client to perform pathname translation and lookup
61operations.
62The
63.Nm
64functions will increment the reference count for the vnode in question.
65The reference count has to be decremented after use of the vnode, by
66using either
67.Xr vrele 9
68or
69.Xr vput 9 ,
70depending on whether the
71.Dv LOCKLEAF
72flag was specified or not.
73.Pp
74The
75.Fn NDINIT
76function is used to initialize
77.Nm
78components.
79It takes the following arguments:
80.Bl -tag -width ".Fa segflg"
81.It Fa ndp
82The
83.Vt "struct nameidata"
84to initialize.
85.It Fa op
86The operation which
87.Fn namei
88will perform.
89The following operations are valid:
90.Dv LOOKUP , CREATE , DELETE ,
91and
92.Dv RENAME .
93The latter three are just setup for those
94effects; just calling
95.Fn namei
96will not result in
97.Fn VOP_RENAME
98being called.
99.It Fa flags
100Operation flags.
101Several of these can be effective at the same time.
102.It Fa segflg
103UIO segment indicator.
104This indicates if the name of the object is in userspace
105.Pq Dv UIO_USERSPACE
106or in the kernel address space
107.Pq Dv UIO_SYSSPACE .
108.It Fa namep
109Pointer to the component's pathname buffer
110(the file or directory name that will be looked up).
111.It Fa td
112The thread context to use for
113.Nm
114operations and locks.
115.El
116.Sh NAMEI OPERATION FLAGS
117The
118.Fn namei
119function takes the following set of
120.Dq "operation flags"
121that influence its operation:
122.Bl -tag -width ".Dv WANTPARENT"
123.It Dv LOCKLEAF
124Lock vnode on return.
125This is a full lock of the vnode; the
126.Xr VOP_UNLOCK 9
127should be used
128to release the lock (or
129.Xr vput 9
130which is equivalent to calling
131.Xr VOP_UNLOCK 9
132followed by
133.Xr vrele 9 ,
134all in one).
135.It Dv LOCKPARENT
136This flag lets the
137.Fn namei
138function return the parent (directory) vnode,
139.Va ni_dvp
140in locked state, unless it is identical to
141.Va ni_vp ,
142in which case
143.Va ni_dvp
144is not locked per se (but may be locked due to
145.Dv LOCKLEAF ) .
146If a lock is enforced, it should be released using
147.Xr vput 9
148or
149.Xr VOP_UNLOCK 9
150and
151.Xr vrele 9 .
152.It Dv WANTPARENT
153This flag allows the
154.Fn namei
155function to return the parent (directory) vnode in an unlocked state.
156The parent vnode must be released separately by using
157.Xr vrele 9 .
158.It Dv NOCACHE
159Avoid
160.Fn namei
161creating this entry in the namecache if it is not
162already present.
163Normally,
164.Fn namei
165will add entries to the name cache
166if they are not already there.
167.It Dv FOLLOW
168With this flag,
169.Fn namei
170will follow the symbolic link if the last part
171of the path supplied is a symbolic link (i.e., it will return a vnode
172for whatever the link points at, instead for the link itself).
173.It Dv NOFOLLOW
174Do not follow symbolic links (pseudo).
175This flag is not looked for by the actual code, which looks for
176.Dv FOLLOW .
177.Dv NOFOLLOW
178is used to indicate to the source code reader that symlinks
179are intentionally not followed.
180.It Dv SAVENAME
181Do not free the pathname buffer at the end of the
182.Fn namei
183invocation; instead, free it later in
184.Fn NDFREE
185so that the caller may access the pathname buffer.
186See below for details.
187.It Dv SAVESTART
188Retain an additional reference to the parent directory; do not free
189the pathname buffer.
190See below for details.
191.El
192.Sh ALLOCATED ELEMENTS
193The
194.Vt nameidata
195structure is composed of the following fields:
196.Bl -tag -width ".Va ni_cnd.cn_pnbuf"
197.It Va ni_startdir
198In the normal case, this is either the current directory or the root.
199It is the current directory if the name passed in does not start with
200.Ql /
201and we have not gone through any symlinks with an absolute path, and
202the root otherwise.
203.Pp
204In this case, it is only used by
205.Fn lookup ,
206and should not be
207considered valid after a call to
208.Fn namei .
209If
210.Dv SAVESTART
211is set, this is set to the same as
212.Va ni_dvp ,
213with an extra
214.Xr vref 9 .
215To block
216.Fn NDFREE
217from releasing
218.Va ni_startdir ,
219the
220.Dv NDF_NO_STARTDIR_RELE
221can be set.
222.It Va ni_dvp
223Vnode pointer to directory of the object on which lookup is performed.
224This is available on successful return if
225.Dv LOCKPARENT
226or
227.Dv WANTPARENT
228is set.
229It is locked if
230.Dv LOCKPARENT
231is set.
232Freeing this in
233.Fn NDFREE
234can be inhibited by
235.Dv NDF_NO_DVP_RELE , NDF_NO_DVP_PUT ,
236or
237.Dv NDF_NO_DVP_UNLOCK
238(with the obvious effects).
239.It Va ni_vp
240Vnode pointer to the resulting object,
241.Dv NULL
242otherwise.
243The
244.Va v_usecount
245field of this vnode is incremented.
246If
247.Dv LOCKLEAF
248is set, it is also locked.
249.Pp
250Freeing this in
251.Fn NDFREE
252can be inhibited by
253.Dv NDF_NO_VP_RELE , NDF_NO_VP_PUT ,
254or
255.Dv NDF_NO_VP_UNLOCK
256(with the obvious effects).
257.It Va ni_cnd.cn_pnbuf
258The pathname buffer contains the location of the file or directory
259that will be used by the
260.Nm
261operations.
262It is managed by the
263.Xr uma 9
264zone allocation interface.
265If the
266.Dv SAVESTART
267or
268.Dv SAVENAME
269flag is set, then the pathname buffer is available
270after calling the
271.Fn namei
272function.
273.Pp
274To only deallocate resources used by the pathname buffer,
275.Va ni_cnd.cn_pnbuf ,
276then
277.Dv NDF_ONLY_PNBUF
278flag can be passed to the
279.Fn NDFREE
280function.
281To keep the pathname buffer intact,
282the
283.Dv NDF_NO_FREE_PNBUF
284flag can be passed to the
285.Fn NDFREE
286function.
287.El
288.Sh RETURN VALUES
289If successful,
290.Fn namei
291will return 0, otherwise it will return an error.
292.Sh FILES
293.Bl -tag -width Pa
294.It Pa src/sys/kern/vfs_lookup.c
295.El
296.Sh ERRORS
297Errors which
298.Fn namei
299may return:
300.Bl -tag -width Er
301.It Bq Er ENOTDIR
302A component of the specified pathname is not a directory when a directory is
303expected.
304.It Bq Er ENAMETOOLONG
305A component of a pathname exceeded 255 characters,
306or an entire pathname exceeded 1023 characters.
307.It Bq Er ENOENT
308A component of the specified pathname does not exist,
309or the pathname is an empty string.
310.It Bq Er EACCES
311An attempt is made to access a file in a way forbidden by its file access
312permissions.
313.It Bq Er ELOOP
314Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.
315.It Bq Er EISDIR
316An attempt is made to open a directory with write mode specified.
317.It Bq Er EINVAL
318The last component of the pathname specified for a
319.Dv DELETE
320or
321.Dv RENAME
322operation is
323.Ql \&. .
324.It Bq Er EROFS
325An attempt is made to modify a file or directory on a read-only file system.
326.El
327.Sh SEE ALSO
328.Xr uio 9 ,
329.Xr uma 9 ,
330.Xr VFS 9 ,
331.Xr vnode 9 ,
332.Xr vput 9 ,
333.Xr vref 9
334.Sh AUTHORS
335.An -nosplit
336This manual page was written by
337.An Eivind Eklund Aq Mt eivind@FreeBSD.org
338and later significantly revised by
339.An Hiten M. Pandya Aq Mt hmp@FreeBSD.org .
340.Sh BUGS
341The
342.Dv LOCKPARENT
343flag does not always result in the parent vnode being locked.
344This results in complications when the
345.Dv LOCKPARENT
346is used.
347In order to solve this for the cases where both
348.Dv LOCKPARENT
349and
350.Dv LOCKLEAF
351are used, it is necessary to resort to recursive locking.
352