sigqueue(3)

NAME#

sigqueue - queue a signal and data to a process

LIBRARY#

Standard C library (libc, -lc)

SYNOPSIS#

#include <signal.h>

int sigqueue(pid_t \npid\n, int \nsig\n, const union sigval \nvalue\n);

sigqueue():

\n
    _POSIX_C_SOURCE >= 199309L

DESCRIPTION#

sigqueue() sends the signal specified in sig to the process whose PID is given in pid. The permissions required to send a signal are the same as for kill(2). As with kill(2), the null signal (0) can be used to check if a process with a given PID exists.

The value argument is used to specify an accompanying item of data (either an integer or a pointer value) to be sent with the signal, and has the following type:

union sigval {
\n
    int   sival_int;
\n
    void *sival_ptr;
};

If the receiving process has installed a handler for this signal using the SA_SIGINFO flag to sigaction(2), then it can obtain this data via the si_value field of the siginfo_t structure passed as the second argument to the handler. Furthermore, the si_code field of that structure will be set to SI_QUEUE.

RETURN VALUE#

On success, sigqueue() returns 0, indicating that the signal was successfully queued to the receiving process. Otherwise, -1 is returned and errno is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS#

EAGAIN

The limit of signals which may be queued has been reached. (See signal(7) for further information.)

EINVAL

sig was invalid.

EPERM

The process does not have permission to send the signal to the receiving process. For the required permissions, see kill(2).

ESRCH

No process has a PID matching pid.

ATTRIBUTES#

For an explanation of the terms used in this section, see attributes(7).

VERSIONS#

C library/kernel differences#

On Linux, sigqueue() is implemented using the rt_sigqueueinfo(2) system call. The system call differs in its third argument, which is the siginfo_t structure that will be supplied to the receiving process's signal handler or returned by the receiving process's sigtimedwait(2) call. Inside the glibc sigqueue() wrapper, this argument, uinfo, is initialized as follows:

uinfo.si_signo = sig;      /* Argument supplied to sigqueue() */
uinfo.si_code = SI_QUEUE;
uinfo.si_pid = getpid();   /* Process ID of sender */
uinfo.si_uid = getuid();   /* Real UID of sender */
uinfo.si_value = val;      /* Argument supplied to sigqueue() */

STANDARDS#

POSIX.1-2008.

HISTORY#

Linux 2.2. POSIX.1-2001.

NOTES#

If this function results in the sending of a signal to the process that invoked it, and that signal was not blocked by the calling thread, and no other threads were willing to handle this signal (either by having it unblocked, or by waiting for it using sigwait(3)), then at least some signal must be delivered to this thread before this function returns.

SEE ALSO#

kill(2), rt_sigqueueinfo(2), sigaction(2), signal(2), pthread_sigqueue(3), sigwait(3), signal(7)