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


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

NAME         top

       sync_file_range - sync a file segment with disk

SYNOPSIS         top

       #define _GNU_SOURCE
       #include <fcntl.h>

       int sync_file_range(int fd, off64_t offset, off64_t nbytes,
                           unsigned int flags);

DESCRIPTION         top

       sync_file_range() permits fine control when synchronizing the open file
       referred to by the file descriptor fd with disk.

       offset is the starting byte of the file range to be synchronized.  nbytes
       specifies the length of the range to be synchronized, in bytes; if nbytes is
       zero, then all bytes from offset through to the end of file are synchronized.
       Synchronization is in units of the system page size: offset is rounded down to
       a page boundary; (offset+nbytes-1) is rounded up to a page boundary.

       The flags bit-mask argument can include any of the following values:

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE
              Wait upon write-out of all pages in the specified range that have
              already been submitted to the device driver for write-out before
              performing any write.

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
              Initiate write-out of all dirty pages in the specified range which are
              not presently submitted write-out.  Note that even this may block if
              you attempt to write more than request queue size.

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_AFTER
              Wait upon write-out of all pages in the range after performing any
              write.

       Specifying flags as 0 is permitted, as a no-op.

Some details

       None of these operations write out the file's metadata.  Therefore, unless the
       application is strictly performing overwrites of already-instantiated disk
       blocks, there are no guarantees that the data will be available after a crash.

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE and SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_AFTER will detect any I/O
       errors or ENOSPC conditions and will return these to the caller.

       Useful combinations of the flags bits are:

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE | SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
              Ensures that all pages in the specified range which were dirty when
              sync_file_range() was called are placed under write-out.  This is a
              start-write-for-data-integrity operation.

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
              Start write-out of all dirty pages in the specified range which are not
              presently under write-out.  This is an asynchronous flush-to-disk
              operation.  This is not suitable for data integrity operations.

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE (or SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_AFTER)
              Wait for completion of write-out of all pages in the specified range.
              This can be used after an earlier SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE |
              SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE operation to wait for completion of that
              operation, and obtain its result.

       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE | SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE |
       SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_AFTER
              This is a write-for-data-integrity operation that will ensure that all
              pages in the specified range which were dirty when sync_file_range()
              was called are committed to disk.

RETURN VALUE         top

       On success, sync_file_range() returns 0; on failure -1 is returned and errno
       is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS         top

       EBADF  fd is not a valid file descriptor.

       EINVAL flags specifies an invalid bit; or offset or nbytes is invalid.

       EIO    I/O error.

       ENOMEM Out of memory.

       ENOSPC Out of disk space.

       ESPIPE fd refers to something other than a regular file, a block device, a
              directory, or a symbolic link.

VERSIONS         top

       sync_file_range() appeared on Linux in kernel 2.6.17.

CONFORMING TO         top

       This system call is Linux-specific, and should be avoided in portable
       programs.

SEE ALSO         top

       fdatasync(2), fsync(2), msync(2), sync(2), feature_test_macros(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                                 2008-05-27                   SYNC_FILE_RANGE(2)