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415f63be 2.\" Copyright (C) 2006, 2014 Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>
ecd96f7c 3.\" Copyright (C) 2014 Heinrich Schuchardt <xypron.glpk@gmx.de>
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4d2b74dd 26.\"
ecd96f7c 27.TH INOTIFY 7 2014-05-23 "Linux" "Linux Programmer's Manual"
4d2b74dd 28.SH NAME
9ee4a2b6 29inotify \- monitoring filesystem events
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30.SH DESCRIPTION
31The
c13182ef 32.I inotify
9ee4a2b6 33API provides a mechanism for monitoring filesystem events.
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34Inotify can be used to monitor individual files,
35or to monitor directories.
36When a directory is monitored, inotify will return events
37for the directory itself, and for files inside the directory.
38
c13182ef 39The following system calls are used with this API:
356911f6 40.IP * 3
4d2b74dd 41.BR inotify_init (2)
c13182ef 42creates an inotify instance and returns a file descriptor
a2cc46ca 43referring to the inotify instance.
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44The more recent
45.BR inotify_init1 (2)
46is like
47.BR inotify_init (2),
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48but has a
49.IR flags
50argument that provides access to some extra functionality.
51.IP *
4d2b74dd 52.BR inotify_add_watch (2)
a2cc46ca 53manipulates the "watch list" associated with an inotify instance.
3a065ac0 54Each item ("watch") in the watch list specifies the pathname of
c13182ef 55a file or directory,
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56along with some set of events that the kernel should monitor for the
57file referred to by that pathname.
63f6a20a 58.BR inotify_add_watch (2)
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59either creates a new watch item, or modifies an existing watch.
60Each watch has a unique "watch descriptor", an integer
61returned by
63f6a20a 62.BR inotify_add_watch (2)
4d2b74dd 63when the watch is created.
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64.IP *
65When events occur for monitored files and directories,
66those events are made available to the application as structured data that
67can be read from the inotify file descriptor using
68.BR read (2)
69(see below).
70.IP *
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71.BR inotify_rm_watch (2)
72removes an item from an inotify watch list.
356911f6 73.IP *
c13182ef 74When all file descriptors referring to an inotify
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75instance have been closed (using
76.BR close (2)),
c13182ef 77the underlying object and its resources are
3b777aff 78freed for reuse by the kernel;
4d2b74dd 79all associated watches are automatically freed.
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80
81With careful programming,
82an application can use inotify to efficiently monitor and cache
83the state of a set of filesystem objects.
84However, robust applications should allow for the fact that bugs
85in the monitoring logic or races of the kind described below
86may leave the cache inconsistent with the filesystem state.
87It is probably wise to to do some consistency checking,
88and rebuild the cache when inconsistencies are detected.
ff6e2397 89.SS Reading events from an inotify file descriptor
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90To determine what events have occurred, an application
91.BR read (2)s
92from the inotify file descriptor.
c13182ef 93If no events have so far occurred, then,
11da88fb 94assuming a blocking file descriptor,
63f6a20a 95.BR read (2)
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96will block until at least one event occurs
97(unless interrupted by a signal,
98in which case the call fails with the error
99.BR EINTR ;
100see
101.BR signal (7)).
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102
103Each successful
63f6a20a 104.BR read (2)
4d2b74dd 105returns a buffer containing one or more of the following structures:
a08ea57c 106.in +4n
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107.nf
108
109struct inotify_event {
110 int wd; /* Watch descriptor */
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111.\" FIXME . The type of the 'wd' field should probably be "int32_t".
112.\" I submitted a patch to fix this. See the LKML thread
113.\" "[patch] Fix type errors in inotify interfaces", 18 Nov 2008
6e6231c1 114.\" Glibc bug filed: http://sources.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=7040
4d2b74dd 115 uint32_t mask; /* Mask of events */
c13182ef 116 uint32_t cookie; /* Unique cookie associating related
4d2b74dd 117 events (for rename(2)) */
84c517a4 118 uint32_t len; /* Size of \fIname\fP field */
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119 char name[]; /* Optional null-terminated name */
120};
121.fi
a08ea57c 122.in
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123
124.I wd
125identifies the watch for which this event occurs.
c13182ef 126It is one of the watch descriptors returned by a previous call to
63f6a20a 127.BR inotify_add_watch (2).
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128
129.I mask
130contains bits that describe the event that occurred (see below).
131
132.I cookie
133is a unique integer that connects related events.
33a0ccb2 134Currently this is used only for rename events, and
4d2b74dd 135allows the resulting pair of
bc636d8a 136.B IN_MOVED_FROM
c13182ef 137and
bc636d8a 138.B IN_MOVED_TO
4d2b74dd 139events to be connected by the application.
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140For all other event types,
141.I cookie
142is set to 0.
4d2b74dd 143
c13182ef 144The
4d2b74dd 145.I name
33a0ccb2 146field is present only when an event is returned
c13182ef 147for a file inside a watched directory;
4d2b74dd 148it identifies the file pathname relative to the watched directory.
c13182ef 149This pathname is null-terminated,
1aff5804 150and may include further null bytes (\(aq\\0\(aq) to align subsequent reads to a
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151suitable address boundary.
152
153The
154.I len
c13182ef 155field counts all of the bytes in
4d2b74dd 156.IR name ,
c13182ef 157including the null bytes;
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158the length of each
159.I inotify_event
160structure is thus
655684a9 161.IR "sizeof(struct inotify_event)+len" .
c7e3ee6f 162
988db661 163The behavior when the buffer given to
c7e3ee6f 164.BR read (2)
988db661 165is too small to return information about the next event depends
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166on the kernel version: in kernels before 2.6.21,
167.BR read (2)
168returns 0; since kernel 2.6.21,
169.BR read (2)
170fails with the error
171.BR EINVAL .
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172Specifying a buffer of size
173
174 sizeof(struct inotify_event) + NAME_MAX + 1
175
176will be sufficient to read at least one event.
4d2b74dd 177.SS inotify events
c13182ef 178The
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179.BR inotify_add_watch (2)
180.I mask
c13182ef 181argument and the
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182.I mask
183field of the
184.I inotify_event
185structure returned when
186.BR read (2)ing
187an inotify file descriptor are both bit masks identifying
188inotify events.
189The following bits can be specified in
190.I mask
191when calling
63f6a20a 192.BR inotify_add_watch (2)
c13182ef 193and may be returned in the
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194.I mask
195field returned by
63f6a20a 196.BR read (2):
64aa9bcb 197.RS 4
c577b95c 198.TP
f23fc716 199.BR IN_ACCESS " (*)"
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200File was accessed (e.g.,
201.BR read (2),
f23fc716 202.BR execve (2)).
3f174f7d 203.TP
f23fc716 204.BR IN_ATTRIB " (*)"
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205Metadata changed\(emfor example, permissions (e.g.,
206.BR chmod (2)),
207timestamps (e.g.,
208.BR utimensat (2)),
209extended attributes
210.RB ( setxattr (2)),
211link count (since Linux 2.6.25; e.g.,
212for the target of
213.BR link (2)
214and for
215.BR unlink (2)),
216and user/group ID (e.g.,
217.BR chown (2)).
3f174f7d 218.TP
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219.BR IN_CLOSE_WRITE " (*)"
220File opened for writing was closed.
3f174f7d 221.TP
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222.BR IN_CLOSE_NOWRITE " (*)"
223File not opened for writing was closed.
3f174f7d 224.TP
f23fc716 225.BR IN_CREATE " (*)"
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226File/directory created in watched directory (e.g.,
227.BR open (2)
228.BR O_CREAT ,
229.BR mkdir (2),
230.BR link (2),
1a737afd 231.BR symlink (2),
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232.BR bind (2)
233on a UNIX domain socket).
3f174f7d 234.TP
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235.BR IN_DELETE " (*)"
236File/directory deleted from watched directory.
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237.TP
238.B IN_DELETE_SELF
239Watched file/directory was itself deleted.
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240(This event also occurs if an object is moved to another filesystem,
241since
242.BR mv (1)
243in effect copies the file to the other filesystem and
49b07b8f 244then deletes it from the original filesystem.)
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245In addition, an
246.B IN_IGNORED
247event will subsequently be generated for the watch descriptor.
3f174f7d 248.TP
f23fc716 249.BR IN_MODIFY " (*)"
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250File was modified (e.g.,
251.BR write (2),
252.BR truncate (2)).
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253.TP
254.B IN_MOVE_SELF
255Watched file/directory was itself moved.
256.TP
f23fc716 257.BR IN_MOVED_FROM " (*)"
107375cf 258Generated for the directory containing the old filename
f23fc716 259when a file is renamed.
3f174f7d 260.TP
f23fc716 261.BR IN_MOVED_TO " (*)"
107375cf 262Generated for the directory containing the new filename
f23fc716 263when a file is renamed.
3f174f7d 264.TP
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265.BR IN_OPEN " (*)"
266File was opened.
64aa9bcb 267.RE
4d2b74dd 268.PP
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269When monitoring a directory,
270the events marked with an asterisk (*) above can occur for
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271files in the directory, in which case the
272.I name
273field in the returned
274.I inotify_event
275structure identifies the name of the file within the directory.
276.PP
277The
278.B IN_ALL_EVENTS
279macro is defined as a bit mask of all of the above events.
280This macro can be used as the
281.I mask
282argument when calling
63f6a20a 283.BR inotify_add_watch (2).
4d2b74dd 284
dede00fe 285Two additional convenience macros are defined:
64aa9bcb 286.RS 4
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287.TP
288.BR IN_MOVE
289Equates to
290.BR "IN_MOVED_FROM | IN_MOVED_TO" .
291.TP
292.BR IN_CLOSE
293Equates to
294.BR "IN_CLOSE_WRITE | IN_CLOSE_NOWRITE" .
64aa9bcb 295.RE
4d2b74dd 296.PP
c13182ef 297The following further bits can be specified in
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298.I mask
299when calling
63f6a20a 300.BR inotify_add_watch (2):
64aa9bcb 301.RS 4
c577b95c 302.TP
31daf529 303.BR IN_DONT_FOLLOW " (since Linux 2.6.15)"
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304Don't dereference
305.I pathname
306if it is a symbolic link.
dda869a4 307.TP
0ff2cc88 308.BR IN_EXCL_UNLINK " (since Linux 2.6.36)"
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309.\" commit 8c1934c8d70b22ca8333b216aec6c7d09fdbd6a6
310By default, when watching events on the children of a directory,
311events are generated for children even after they have been unlinked
312from the directory.
313This can result in large numbers of uninteresting events for
314some applications (e.g., if watching
315.IR /tmp ,
316in which many applications create temporary files whose
317names are immediately unlinked).
318Specifying
319.B IN_EXCL_UNLINK
320changes the default behavior,
321so that events are not generated for children after
322they have been unlinked from the watched directory.
323.TP
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324.B IN_MASK_ADD
325Add (OR) events to watch mask for this pathname if
326it already exists (instead of replacing mask).
327.TP
328.B IN_ONESHOT
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329Monitor
330.I pathname
331for one event, then remove from
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332watch list.
333.TP
31daf529 334.BR IN_ONLYDIR " (since Linux 2.6.15)"
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335Only watch
336.I pathname
337if it is a directory.
64aa9bcb 338.RE
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339.PP
340The following bits may be set in the
341.I mask
342field returned by
63f6a20a 343.BR read (2):
64aa9bcb 344.RS 4
c577b95c 345.TP
dda869a4 346.B IN_IGNORED
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347Watch was removed explicitly
348.RB ( inotify_rm_watch (2))
9ee4a2b6 349or automatically (file was deleted, or filesystem was unmounted).
7b5151b7 350See also BUGS.
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351.TP
352.B IN_ISDIR
353Subject of this event is a directory.
354.TP
355.B IN_Q_OVERFLOW
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356Event queue overflowed
357.RI ( wd
358is \-1 for this event).
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359.TP
360.B IN_UNMOUNT
9ee4a2b6 361Filesystem containing watched object was unmounted.
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362In addition, an
363.B IN_IGNORED
364event will subsequently be generated for the watch descriptor.
64aa9bcb 365.RE
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366.SS Examples
367Suppose an application is watching the directory
368.I dir
369and the file
370.IR dir/myfile
371for all events.
372The examples below show some events that will be generated
373for these two objects.
374.RS 4
375.TP
376fd = open("dir/myfile", O_RDWR);
377Generates
378.B IN_OPEN
379events for both
380.I dir
381and
382.IR dir/myfile .
383.TP
384read(fd, buf, count);
385Generates
386.B IN_ACCESS
387events for both
388.I dir
389and
390.IR dir/myfile .
391.TP
392write(fd, buf, count);
393Generates
394.B IN_MODIFY
395events for both
396.I dir
397and
398.IR dir/myfile .
399.TP
400fchmod(fd, mode);
401Generates
402.B IN_ATTRIB
403events for both
404.I dir
405and
406.IR dir/myfile .
407.TP
408close(fd);
409Generates
410.B IN_CLOSE_WRITE
411events for both
412.I dir
413and
414.IR dir/myfile .
415.RE
416.PP
417Suppose an application is watching the directories
418.I dir1
419and
d2c3d8a8 420.IR dir2 ,
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421and the file
422.IR dir1/myfile .
423The following examples show some events that may be generated.
424.RS 4
425.TP
d2c3d8a8 426link("dir1/myfile", "dir2/new");
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427Generates an
428.B IN_ATTRIB
429event for
430.IR myfile
431and an
432.B IN_CREATE
433event for
434.IR dir2 .
435.TP
436rename("dir1/myfile", "dir2/myfile");
437Generates an
438.B IN_MOVED_FROM
439event for
440.IR dir1 ,
441an
442.B IN_MOVED_TO
443event for
444.IR dir2 ,
445and an
446.B IN_MOVE_SELF
447event for
448.IR myfile .
449The
450.B IN_MOVED_FROM
451and
452.B IN_MOVED_TO
453events will have the same
454.I cookie
455value.
456.RE
457.PP
458Suppose that
459.IR dir1/xx
460and
461.IR dir2/yy
462are (the only) links to the same file, and an application is watching
463.IR dir1 ,
464.IR dir2 ,
465.IR dir1/xx ,
466and
467.IR dir2/yy .
468Executing the following calls in the order given below will generate
469the following events:
470.RS 4
471.TP
472unlink("dir2/yy");
d2c3d8a8 473Generates an
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474.BR IN_ATTRIB
475event for
476.IR xx
477(because its link count changes)
478and an
479.B IN_DELETE
480event for
481.IR dir2 .
482.TP
483unlink("dir1/xx");
484Generates
485.BR IN_ATTRIB ,
486.BR IN_DELETE_SELF ,
487and
488.BR IN_IGNORED
489events for
490.IR xx ,
491and an
492.BR IN_DELETE
d2c3d8a8 493event for
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494.IR dir1 .
495.RE
496.PP
497Suppose an application is watching the directory
498.IR dir
499and (the empty) directory
500.IR dir/subdir .
501The following examples show some events that may be generated.
502.RS 4
503.TP
504mkdir("dir/new", mode);
505Generates an
506.B "IN_CREATE | IN_ISDIR"
507event for
508.IR dir .
509.TP
d2c3d8a8 510rmdir("dir/subdir");
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511Generates
512.B IN_DELETE_SELF
513and
514.B IN_IGNORED
515events for
516.IR subdir ,
517and an
518.B "IN_DELETE | IN_ISDIR"
519event for
520.IR dir .
521.RE
4d2b74dd 522.SS /proc interfaces
c13182ef 523The following interfaces can be used to limit the amount of
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524kernel memory consumed by inotify:
525.TP
0daa9e92 526.I /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_queued_events
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527The value in this file is used when an application calls
528.BR inotify_init (2)
c13182ef 529to set an upper limit on the number of events that can be
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530queued to the corresponding inotify instance.
531Events in excess of this limit are dropped, but an
532.B IN_Q_OVERFLOW
533event is always generated.
534.TP
0daa9e92 535.I /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_instances
c13182ef 536This specifies an upper limit on the number of inotify instances
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537that can be created per real user ID.
538.TP
0daa9e92 539.I /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_watches
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540This specifies an upper limit on the number of watches
541that can be created per real user ID.
47297adb 542.SH VERSIONS
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543Inotify was merged into the 2.6.13 Linux kernel.
544The required library interfaces were added to glibc in version 2.4.
545.RB ( IN_DONT_FOLLOW ,
546.BR IN_MASK_ADD ,
547and
548.B IN_ONLYDIR
64aa9bcb 549were added in glibc version 2.5.)
47297adb 550.SH CONFORMING TO
8382f16d 551The inotify API is Linux-specific.
47297adb 552.SH NOTES
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553Inotify file descriptors can be monitored using
554.BR select (2),
555.BR poll (2),
c13182ef 556and
2315114c 557.BR epoll (7).
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558When an event is available, the file descriptor indicates as readable.
559
560Since Linux 2.6.25,
561signal-driven I/O notification is available for inotify file descriptors;
562see the discussion of
563.B F_SETFL
564(for setting the
565.B O_ASYNC
566flag),
567.BR F_SETOWN ,
568and
569.B F_SETSIG
570in
571.BR fcntl (2).
572The
573.I siginfo_t
574structure (described in
575.BR sigaction (2))
576that is passed to the signal handler has the following fields set:
577.IR si_fd
578is set to the inotify file descriptor number;
579.IR si_signo
580is set to the signal number;
581.IR si_code
582is set to
583.BR POLL_IN ;
584and
585.B POLLIN
586is set in
587.IR si_band .
4d2b74dd 588
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589If successive output inotify events produced on the
590inotify file descriptor are identical (same
591.IR wd ,
592.IR mask ,
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593.IR cookie ,
594and
3f3698d8 595.IR name ),
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596then they are coalesced into a single event if the
597older event has not yet been read (but see BUGS).
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598This reduces the amount of kernel memory required for the event queue,
599but also means that an application can't use inotify to reliably count
600file events.
4d2b74dd 601
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602The events returned by reading from an inotify file descriptor
603form an ordered queue.
604Thus, for example, it is guaranteed that when renaming from
605one directory to another, events will be produced in the
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606correct order on the inotify file descriptor.
607
608The
609.B FIONREAD
63f6a20a 610.BR ioctl (2)
c13182ef 611returns the number of bytes available to read from an
4d2b74dd 612inotify file descriptor.
613836aa 613.SS Limitations and caveats
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614The inotify API provides no information about the user or process that
615triggered the inotify event.
616In particular, there is no easy
617way for a process that is monitoring events via inotify
618to distinguish events that it triggers
619itself from those that are triggered by other processes.
620
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621Inotify reports only events that a user-space program triggers through
622the filesystem API.
623As a result, it does not catch remote events that occur
624on network filesystems.
625(Applications must fall back to polling the filesystem
626to catch such events.)
fa1d49a6 627Furthermore, various pseudo-filesystems such as
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628.IR /proc ,
629.IR /sys ,
630and
631.IR /dev/pts
632are not monitorable with inotify.
633
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634The inotify API does not report file accesses and modifications that
635may occur because of
636.BR mmap (2)
637and
638.BR msync (2).
639
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640The inotify API identifies affected files by filename.
641However, by the time an application processes an inotify event,
642the filename may already have been deleted or renamed.
643
da977073 644The inotify API identifies events via watch descriptors.
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645It is the application's responsibility to cache a mapping
646(if one is needed) between watch descriptors and pathnames.
647Be aware that directory renamings may affect multiple cached pathnames.
648
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649Inotify monitoring of directories is not recursive:
650to monitor subdirectories under a directory,
651additional watches must be created.
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652This can take a significant amount time for large directory trees.
653
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654If monitoring an entire directory subtree,
655and a new subdirectory is created in that tree or an existing directory
656is renamed into that tree,
657be aware that by the time you create a watch for the new subdirectory,
658new files (and subdirectories) may already exist inside the subdirectory.
659Therefore, you may want to scan the contents of the subdirectory
660immediately after adding the watch (and, if desired,
661recursively add watches for any subdirectories that it contains).
662
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663Note that the event queue can overflow.
664In this case, events are lost.
09fa72fa 665Robust applications should handle the possibility of
613836aa 666lost events gracefully.
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667For example, it may be necessary to rebuild part or all of
668the application cache.
669(One simple, but possibly expensive,
670approach is to close the inotify file descriptor, empty the cache,
85e179c5 671create a new inotify file descriptor,
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672and then re-create watches and cache entries
673for the objects to be monitored.)
85e179c5 674.SS Dealing with rename() events
fa51f4d9 675As noted above, the
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676.B IN_MOVED_FROM
677and
678.B IN_MOVED_TO
fa51f4d9 679event pair that is generated by
85e179c5 680.BR rename (2)
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681can be matched up via their shared cookie value.
682However, the task of matching has some challenges.
683
684These two events are usually consecutive in the event stream available
685when reading from the inotify file descriptor.
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686However, this is not guaranteed.
687If multiple processes are triggering events for monitored objects,
688then (on rare occasions) an arbitrary number of
689other events may appear between the
690.B IN_MOVED_FROM
691and
692.B IN_MOVED_TO
693events.
694
695Matching up the
696.B IN_MOVED_FROM
697and
698.B IN_MOVED_TO
699event pair generated by
700.BR rename (2)
701is thus inherently racy.
702(Don't forget that if an object is renamed outside of a monitored directory,
703there may not even be an
704.BR IN_MOVED_TO
705event.)
706Heuristic approaches (e.g., assume the events are always consecutive)
707can be used to ensure a match in most cases,
708but will inevitably miss some cases,
709causing the application to perceive the
710.B IN_MOVED_FROM
711and
712.B IN_MOVED_TO
713events as being unrelated.
714If watch descriptors are destroyed and re-created as a result,
715then those watch descriptors will be inconsistent with
716the watch descriptors in any pending events.
6f1a4954 717(Re-creating the inotify file descriptor and rebuilding the cache may
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718be useful to deal with this scenario.)
719
720Applications should also allow for the possibility that the
721.B IN_MOVED_FROM
722event was the last event that could fit in the buffer
723returned by the current call to
724.BR read (2),
725and the accompanying
726.B IN_MOVED_TO
727event might be fetched only on the next
728.BR read (2).
47297adb 729.SH BUGS
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730.\" FIXME kernel commit 611da04f7a31b2208e838be55a42c7a1310ae321
731.\" implies that unmount events were buggy 2.6.11 to 2.6.36
732.\"
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733In kernels before 2.6.16, the
734.B IN_ONESHOT
c13182ef 735.I mask
ed7b0235 736flag does not work.
6f0ab035 737
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738As originally designed and implemented, the
739.B IN_ONESHOT
740flag did not cause an
741.B IN_IGNORED
742event to be generated when the watch was dropped after one event.
743However, as an unintended effect of other changes,
744since Linux 2.6.36, an
745.B IN_IGNORED
746event is generated in this case.
747
6f0ab035 748Before kernel 2.6.25,
22129aa9 749.\" commit 1c17d18e3775485bf1e0ce79575eb637a94494a2
9ed6b517 750the kernel code that was intended to coalesce successive identical events
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751(i.e., the two most recent events could potentially be coalesced
752if the older had not yet been read)
753instead checked if the most recent event could be coalesced with the
754.I oldest
755unread event.
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756.SH EXAMPLE
757The following program demonstrates the usage of the inotify API.
758It marks the directories passed as a command-line arguments
759and waits for events of type
760.BR IN_OPEN ,
761.BR IN_CLOSE_NOWRITE
762and
763.BR IN_CLOSE_WRITE .
764.PP
765The following output was recorded while editing the file
766.I /home/user/temp/foo
767and listing directory
768.IR /tmp .
769Before the file and the directory were opened,
770.B IN_OPEN
771events occurred.
772After the file was closed, an
773.B IN_CLOSE_WRITE
774event occurred.
775After the directory was closed, an
776.B IN_CLOSE_NOWRITE
777event occurred.
778Execution of the program ended when the user pressed the ENTER key.
779.SS Example output
780.in +4n
781.nf
782$ ./inotify.7.example /tmp /home/user/temp
783Press enter key to terminate.
784Listening for events.
785IN_OPEN: /home/user/temp/foo [file]
786IN_CLOSE_WRITE: /home/user/temp/foo [file]
787IN_OPEN: /tmp/ [directory]
788IN_CLOSE_NOWRITE: /tmp/ [directory]
789
790Listening for events stopped.
791.fi
792.in
793.SS Program source
794.nf
795#include <errno.h>
796#include <poll.h>
797#include <stdio.h>
798#include <stdlib.h>
799#include <sys/inotify.h>
800#include <unistd.h>
801
802/* Read all available inotify events from the file descriptor 'fd'.
803 wd is the table of watch descriptors for the directories in argv.
804 argc is the length of wd and argv.
805 argv is the list of watched directories.
806 Entry 0 of wd and argv is unused. */
807
808static void
809handle_events(int fd, int *wd, int argc, char* argv[])
810{
811 /* Some systems cannot read integer variables if they are
812 not properly aligned. On other systems incorrect alignment
813 may decrease performance.
814 Hence, the buffer used for reading from the inotify file
815 descriptor should have the same alignment as
816 struct inotify_event. */
817 char buf[4096]
818 __attribute__ ((aligned(__alignof__(struct inotify_event))));
819 const struct inotify_event *event;
820 int i;
821 ssize_t len;
822 char *ptr;
823
824 /* Loop while events can be read from inotify file descriptor. */
825
826 for (;;) {
827
828 /* Read some events. */
829
830 len = read(fd, buf, sizeof buf);
831 if (len == \-1 && errno != EAGAIN) {
832 perror("read");
833 exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
834 }
835
836 /* If the nonblocking read() found no events to read, then
837 it returns \-1 with errno set to EAGAIN. In that case,
838 we exit the loop. */
839
840 if (len <= 0)
841 break;
842
843 /* Loop over all events in the buffer */
844
845 for (ptr = buf; ptr < buf + len;
846 ptr += sizeof(struct inotify_event) + event\->len) {
847
848 event = (const struct inotify_event *) ptr;
849
850 /* Print event type */
851
852 if (event\->mask & IN_OPEN)
853 printf("IN_OPEN: ");
854 if (event\->mask & IN_CLOSE_NOWRITE)
855 printf("IN_CLOSE_NOWRITE: ");
856 if (event\->mask & IN_CLOSE_WRITE)
857 printf("IN_CLOSE_WRITE: ");
858
859 /* Print the name of the watched directory */
860
861 for (i = 1; i < argc; ++i) {
862 if (wd[i] == event\->wd) {
863 printf("%s/", argv[i]);
864 break;
865 }
866 }
867
868 /* Print the name of the file */
869
870 if (event\->len)
871 printf("%s", event\->name);
872
873 /* Print type of filesystem object */
874
875 if (event\->mask & IN_ISDIR)
876 printf(" [directory]\\n");
877 else
878 printf(" [file]\\n");
879
880 }
881 }
882}
883
884int
885main(int argc, char* argv[])
886{
887 char buf;
888 int fd, i, poll_num;
889 int *wd;
890 nfds_t nfds;
891 struct pollfd fds[2];
892
893 if (argc < 2) {
894 printf("Usage: %s PATH [PATH ...]\\n", argv[0]);
895 exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
896 }
897
898 printf("Press ENTER key to terminate.\\n");
899
900 /* Create the file descriptor for accessing the inotify API */
901
902 fd = inotify_init1(IN_NONBLOCK);
903 if (fd == \-1) {
904 perror("inotify_init1");
905 exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
906 }
907
908 /* Allocate memory for watch descriptors */
909
910 wd = calloc(argc, sizeof(int));
911 if (wd == NULL) {
912 perror("calloc");
913 exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
914 }
915
916 /* Mark directories for events
917 \- file was opened
918 \- file was closed */
919
920 for (i = 1; i < argc; i++) {
921 wd[i] = inotify_add_watch(fd, argv[i],
922 IN_OPEN | IN_CLOSE);
923 if (wd[i] == \-1) {
924 fprintf(stderr, "Cannot watch '%s'\\n", argv[i]);
925 perror("inotify_add_watch");
926 exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
927 }
928 }
929
930 /* Prepare for polling */
931
932 nfds = 2;
933
934 /* Console input */
935
936 fds[0].fd = STDIN_FILENO;
937 fds[0].events = POLLIN;
938
939 /* Inotify input */
940
941 fds[1].fd = fd;
942 fds[1].events = POLLIN;
943
944 /* Wait for events and/or terminal input */
945
946 printf("Listening for events.\\n");
947 while (1) {
948 poll_num = poll(fds, nfds, \-1);
949 if (poll_num == \-1) {
950 if (errno == EINTR)
951 continue;
952 perror("poll");
953 exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
954 }
955 if (poll_num > 0) {
956
957 if (fds[0].revents & POLLIN) {
958
959 /* Console input is available. Empty stdin and quit */
960
961 while (read(STDIN_FILENO, &buf, 1) > 0 && buf != '\\n')
962 continue;
963 break;
964 }
965 if (fds[1].revents & POLLIN) {
966
967 /* Inotify events are available */
968 handle_events(fd, wd, argc, argv);
969 }
970 }
971 }
972
973 /* Close inotify file descriptor */
974
975 close(fd);
976 free(wd);
977 printf("Listening for events stopped.\\n");
978 exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
979}
980.fi
47297adb 981.SH SEE ALSO
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982.BR inotifywait (1),
983.BR inotifywatch (1),
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984.BR inotify_add_watch (2),
985.BR inotify_init (2),
43bb5faf 986.BR inotify_init1 (2),
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987.BR inotify_rm_watch (2),
988.BR read (2),
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989.BR stat (2),
990.BR fanotify (7)
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991
992.IR Documentation/filesystems/inotify.txt
993in the Linux kernel source tree