xref: /netbsd-src/lib/libc/sys/acct.2 (revision ae9172d6cd9432a6a1a56760d86b32c57a66c39c)
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32.\"     from: @(#)acct.2	6.5 (Berkeley) 3/10/91
33.\"	$Id: acct.2,v 1.5 1994/04/22 00:13:24 jtc Exp $
34.\"
35.Dd March 10, 1991
36.Dt ACCT 2
37.Os BSD 4
38.Sh NAME
39.Nm acct
40.Nd enable or disable process accounting
41.Sh SYNOPSIS
42.Fd #include <unistd.h>
43.Ft int
44.Fn acct "const char *file"
45.Sh DESCRIPTION
46The
47.Fn acct
48call enables or disables the collection of system accounting
49records.
50If the argument
51.Fa file
52is a nil pointer, accounting is disabled.
53If
54.Fa file
55is an
56.Em existing
57pathname (null-terminated), record collection is enabled and for
58every process initiated which terminates under normal
59conditions an accounting record is appended to
60.Fa file .
61Abnormal conditions of termination are reboots
62or other fatal system problems.
63Records for processes which never terminate can not be
64produced by
65.Fn acct .
66.Pp
67For more information on the record structure used by
68.Fn acct ,
69see
70.Pa /usr/include/sys/acct.h
71and
72.Xr acct 5 .
73.Pp
74This call is permitted only to the super-user.
75.Sh NOTES
76Accounting is automatically disabled when the file system the
77accounting file resides on runs out of space; it is enabled when
78space once again becomes available.
79.Sh RETURN VALUES
80On error -1 is returned.
81The file must exist and the call may be exercised only by the super-user.
82.Sh ERRORS
83.Fn Acct
84will fail if one of the following is true:
85.Bl -tag -width Er
86.It Bq Er EPERM
87The caller is not the super-user.
88.It Bq Er ENOTDIR
89A component of the path prefix is not a directory.
90.It Bq Er ENAMETOOLONG
91A component of a pathname exceeded
92.Dv {NAME_MAX}
93characters, or an entire path name exceeded
94.Dv {PATH_MAX}
95characters.
96.It Bq Er ENOENT
97The named file does not exist.
98.It Bq Er EACCES
99Search permission is denied for a component of the path prefix,
100or the path name is not a regular file.
101.It Bq Er ELOOP
102Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.
103.It Bq Er EROFS
104The named file resides on a read-only file system.
105.It Bq Er EFAULT
106.Fa File
107points outside the process's allocated address space.
108.It Bq Er EIO
109An I/O error occurred while reading from or writing to the file system.
110.El
111.Sh SEE ALSO
112.Xr acct 5 ,
113.Xr sa 8
114.Sh HISTORY
115An
116.Fn acct
117function call appeared in
118.At v7 .
119