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NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | RETURN VALUE | ERRORS | CONFORMING TO | NOTES | SEE ALSO | COLOPHON


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

NAME         top

       epoll_create, epoll_create1 - open an epoll file descriptor

SYNOPSIS         top

       #include <sys/epoll.h>

       int epoll_create(int size);
       int epoll_create1(int flags);

DESCRIPTION         top

       epoll_create() creates an epoll "instance", requesting the kernel to allocate
       an event backing store dimensioned for size descriptors.  The size is not the
       maximum size of the backing store but just a hint to the kernel about how to
       dimension internal structures.  (Nowadays, size is ignored; see NOTES below.)

       epoll_create() returns a file descriptor referring to the new epoll instance.
       This file descriptor is used for all the subsequent calls to the epoll
       interface.  When no longer required, the file descriptor returned by
       epoll_create() should be closed by using close(2).  When all file descriptors
       referring to an epoll instance have been closed, the kernel destroys the
       instance and releases the associated resources for re-use.

       If flags is 0, then, other than the fact that the obsolete size argument is
       dropped, epoll_create1() is the same as epoll_create().  The following value
       can be included in flags to obtain different behavior:

       EPOLL_CLOEXEC
              Set the close-on-exec (FD_CLOEXEC) flag on the new file descriptor.
              See the description of the O_CLOEXEC flag in open(2) for reasons why
              this may be useful.

RETURN VALUE         top

       On success, these system calls return a non-negative file descriptor.  On
       error, -1 is returned, and errno is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS         top

       EINVAL size is not positive.

       EINVAL (epoll_create1()) Invalid value specified in flags.

       EMFILE The per-user limit on the number of epoll instances imposed by
              /proc/sys/fs/epoll/max_user_instances was encountered.  See epoll(7)
              for further details.

       ENFILE The system limit on the total number of open files has been reached.

       ENOMEM There was insufficient memory to create the kernel object.

CONFORMING TO         top

       epoll_create() is Linux-specific, and was introduced in kernel 2.5.44.

NOTES         top

       Since Linux 2.6.8, the size argument is unused.  (The kernel dynamically sizes
       the required data structures without needing this initial hint.)

SEE ALSO         top

       close(2), epoll_ctl(2), epoll_wait(2), epoll(7)

COLOPHON         top

       This page is part of release 3.23 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                                 2009-01-17                      EPOLL_CREATE(2)