xref: /freebsd/share/man/man9/namei.9 (revision 57718be8fa0bd5edc11ab9a72e68cc71982939a6)
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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 March 1, 2012
37.Dt NAMEI 9
38.Os
39.Sh NAME
40.Nm namei ,
41.Nm NDINIT ,
42.Nm NDFREE ,
43.Nm NDHASGIANT
44.Nd pathname translation and lookup operations
45.Sh SYNOPSIS
46.In sys/param.h
47.In sys/fcntl.h
48.In sys/namei.h
49.Ft int
50.Fn namei "struct nameidata *ndp"
51.Ft void
52.Fo NDINIT
53.Fa "struct nameidata *ndp" "u_long op" "u_long flags"
54.Fa "enum uio_seg segflg" "const char *namep" "struct thread *td"
55.Fc
56.Ft void
57.Fn NDFREE "struct nameidata *ndp" "const uint flags"
58.Ft int
59.Fn NDHASGIANT "struct nameidata *ndp"
60.Sh DESCRIPTION
61The
62.Nm
63facility allows the client to perform pathname translation and lookup
64operations.
65The
66.Nm
67functions will increment the reference count for the vnode in question.
68The reference count has to be decremented after use of the vnode, by
69using either
70.Xr vrele 9
71or
72.Xr vput 9 ,
73depending on whether the
74.Dv LOCKLEAF
75flag was specified or not.
76If the
77.Va Giant
78lock is required,
79.Nm
80will acquire it if the caller indicates it is
81.Dv MPSAFE ,
82in which case the caller must later release
83.Va Giant
84based on the results of
85.Fn NDHASGIANT .
86.Pp
87The
88.Fn NDINIT
89function is used to initialize
90.Nm
91components.
92It takes the following arguments:
93.Bl -tag -width ".Fa segflg"
94.It Fa ndp
95The
96.Vt "struct nameidata"
97to initialize.
98.It Fa op
99The operation which
100.Fn namei
101will perform.
102The following operations are valid:
103.Dv LOOKUP , CREATE , DELETE ,
104and
105.Dv RENAME .
106The latter three are just setup for those
107effects; just calling
108.Fn namei
109will not result in
110.Fn VOP_RENAME
111being called.
112.It Fa flags
113Operation flags.
114Several of these can be effective at the same time.
115.It Fa segflg
116UIO segment indicator.
117This indicates if the name of the object is in userspace
118.Pq Dv UIO_USERSPACE
119or in the kernel address space
120.Pq Dv UIO_SYSSPACE .
121.It Fa namep
122Pointer to the component's pathname buffer
123(the file or directory name that will be looked up).
124.It Fa td
125The thread context to use for
126.Nm
127operations and locks.
128.El
129.Sh NAMEI OPERATION FLAGS
130The
131.Fn namei
132function takes the following set of
133.Dq "operation flags"
134that influence its operation:
135.Bl -tag -width ".Dv WANTPARENT"
136.It Dv LOCKLEAF
137Lock vnode on return.
138This is a full lock of the vnode; the
139.Xr VOP_UNLOCK 9
140should be used
141to release the lock (or
142.Xr vput 9
143which is equivalent to calling
144.Xr VOP_UNLOCK 9
145followed by
146.Xr vrele 9 ,
147all in one).
148.It Dv LOCKPARENT
149This flag lets the
150.Fn namei
151function return the parent (directory) vnode,
152.Va ni_dvp
153in locked state, unless it is identical to
154.Va ni_vp ,
155in which case
156.Va ni_dvp
157is not locked per se (but may be locked due to
158.Dv LOCKLEAF ) .
159If a lock is enforced, it should be released using
160.Xr vput 9
161or
162.Xr VOP_UNLOCK 9
163and
164.Xr vrele 9 .
165.It Dv WANTPARENT
166This flag allows the
167.Fn namei
168function to return the parent (directory) vnode in an unlocked state.
169The parent vnode must be released separately by using
170.Xr vrele 9 .
171.It Dv NOCACHE
172Avoid
173.Fn namei
174creating this entry in the namecache if it is not
175already present.
176Normally,
177.Fn namei
178will add entries to the name cache
179if they are not already there.
180.It Dv FOLLOW
181With this flag,
182.Fn namei
183will follow the symbolic link if the last part
184of the path supplied is a symbolic link (i.e., it will return a vnode
185for whatever the link points at, instead for the link itself).
186.It Dv NOFOLLOW
187Do not follow symbolic links (pseudo).
188This flag is not looked for by the actual code, which looks for
189.Dv FOLLOW .
190.Dv NOFOLLOW
191is used to indicate to the source code reader that symlinks
192are intentionally not followed.
193.It Dv SAVENAME
194Do not free the pathname buffer at the end of the
195.Fn namei
196invocation; instead, free it later in
197.Fn NDFREE
198so that the caller may access the pathname buffer.
199See below for details.
200.It Dv SAVESTART
201Retain an additional reference to the parent directory; do not free
202the pathname buffer.
203See below for details.
204.El
205.Sh ALLOCATED ELEMENTS
206The
207.Vt nameidata
208structure is composed of the following fields:
209.Bl -tag -width ".Va ni_cnd.cn_pnbuf"
210.It Va ni_startdir
211In the normal case, this is either the current directory or the root.
212It is the current directory if the name passed in does not start with
213.Ql /
214and we have not gone through any symlinks with an absolute path, and
215the root otherwise.
216.Pp
217In this case, it is only used by
218.Fn lookup ,
219and should not be
220considered valid after a call to
221.Fn namei .
222If
223.Dv SAVESTART
224is set, this is set to the same as
225.Va ni_dvp ,
226with an extra
227.Xr vref 9 .
228To block
229.Fn NDFREE
230from releasing
231.Va ni_startdir ,
232the
233.Dv NDF_NO_STARTDIR_RELE
234can be set.
235.It Va ni_dvp
236Vnode pointer to directory of the object on which lookup is performed.
237This is available on successful return if
238.Dv LOCKPARENT
239or
240.Dv WANTPARENT
241is set.
242It is locked if
243.Dv LOCKPARENT
244is set.
245Freeing this in
246.Fn NDFREE
247can be inhibited by
248.Dv NDF_NO_DVP_RELE , NDF_NO_DVP_PUT ,
249or
250.Dv NDF_NO_DVP_UNLOCK
251(with the obvious effects).
252.It Va ni_vp
253Vnode pointer to the resulting object,
254.Dv NULL
255otherwise.
256The
257.Va v_usecount
258field of this vnode is incremented.
259If
260.Dv LOCKLEAF
261is set, it is also locked.
262.Pp
263Freeing this in
264.Fn NDFREE
265can be inhibited by
266.Dv NDF_NO_VP_RELE , NDF_NO_VP_PUT ,
267or
268.Dv NDF_NO_VP_UNLOCK
269(with the obvious effects).
270.It Va ni_cnd.cn_pnbuf
271The pathname buffer contains the location of the file or directory
272that will be used by the
273.Nm
274operations.
275It is managed by the
276.Xr uma 9
277zone allocation interface.
278If the
279.Dv SAVESTART
280or
281.Dv SAVENAME
282flag is set, then the pathname buffer is available
283after calling the
284.Fn namei
285function.
286.Pp
287To only deallocate resources used by the pathname buffer,
288.Va ni_cnd.cn_pnbuf ,
289then
290.Dv NDF_ONLY_PNBUF
291flag can be passed to the
292.Fn NDFREE
293function.
294To keep the pathname buffer intact,
295the
296.Dv NDF_NO_FREE_PNBUF
297flag can be passed to the
298.Fn NDFREE
299function.
300.El
301.Sh RETURN VALUES
302If successful,
303.Fn namei
304will return 0, otherwise it will return an error.
305.Sh FILES
306.Bl -tag -width Pa
307.It Pa src/sys/kern/vfs_lookup.c
308.El
309.Sh ERRORS
310Errors which
311.Fn namei
312may return:
313.Bl -tag -width Er
314.It Bq Er ENOTDIR
315A component of the specified pathname is not a directory when a directory is
316expected.
317.It Bq Er ENAMETOOLONG
318A component of a pathname exceeded 255 characters,
319or an entire pathname exceeded 1023 characters.
320.It Bq Er ENOENT
321A component of the specified pathname does not exist,
322or the pathname is an empty string.
323.It Bq Er EACCES
324An attempt is made to access a file in a way forbidden by its file access
325permissions.
326.It Bq Er ELOOP
327Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.
328.It Bq Er EISDIR
329An attempt is made to open a directory with write mode specified.
330.It Bq Er EINVAL
331The last component of the pathname specified for a
332.Dv DELETE
333or
334.Dv RENAME
335operation is
336.Ql \&. .
337.It Bq Er EROFS
338An attempt is made to modify a file or directory on a read-only file system.
339.El
340.Sh SEE ALSO
341.Xr uio 9 ,
342.Xr uma 9 ,
343.Xr VFS 9 ,
344.Xr vnode 9 ,
345.Xr vput 9 ,
346.Xr vref 9
347.Sh AUTHORS
348.An -nosplit
349This manual page was written by
350.An Eivind Eklund Aq Mt eivind@FreeBSD.org
351and later significantly revised by
352.An Hiten M. Pandya Aq Mt hmp@FreeBSD.org .
353.Sh BUGS
354The
355.Dv LOCKPARENT
356flag does not always result in the parent vnode being locked.
357This results in complications when the
358.Dv LOCKPARENT
359is used.
360In order to solve this for the cases where both
361.Dv LOCKPARENT
362and
363.Dv LOCKLEAF
364are used, it is necessary to resort to recursive locking.
365.Pp
366Non-MPSAFE file systems exist, requiring callers to conditionally unlock
367.Va Giant .
368