bind - bind a name to a socket

#include <sys/socket.h>
int bind(int sockfd, const struct sockaddr *addr,
 socklen_t addrlen);

When a socket is created with socket(2), it exists in a name space (address family) but has no address assigned to it. bind() assigns the address specified by addr to the socket referred to by the file descriptor sockfd. addrlen specifies the size, in bytes, of the address structure pointed to by addr. Traditionally, this operation is called “assigning a name to a socket”.

It is normally necessary to assign a local address using bind() before a SOCK_STREAM socket may receive connections (see accept(2)).

The rules used in name binding vary between address families. Consult the manual entries in Section 7 for detailed information. For AF_INET, see ip(7); for AF_INET6, see ipv6(7); for AF_UNIX, see unix(7); for AF_APPLETALK, see ddp(7); for AF_PACKET, see packet(7); for AF_X25, see x25(7); and for AF_NETLINK, see netlink(7).

The actual structure passed for the addr argument will depend on the address family. The sockaddr structure is defined as something like:

struct sockaddr {
    sa_family_t sa_family;
    char        sa_data[14];
}

The only purpose of this structure is to cast the structure pointer passed in addr in order to avoid compiler warnings. See EXAMPLES below.

On success, zero is returned. On error, -1 is returned, and errno is set to indicate the error.

An example of the use of bind() with Internet domain sockets can be found in getaddrinfo(3).

The following example shows how to bind a stream socket in the UNIX (AF_UNIX) domain, and accept connections:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <sys/socket.h>
#include <sys/un.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#define MY_SOCK_PATH "/somepath"
#define LISTEN_BACKLOG 50
#define handle_error(msg) \
    do { perror(msg); exit(EXIT_FAILURE); } while (0)
int
main(void)
{
    int                 sfd, cfd;
    socklen_t           peer_addr_size;
    struct sockaddr_un  my_addr, peer_addr;
    sfd = socket(AF_UNIX, SOCK_STREAM, 0);
    if (sfd == -1)
        handle_error("socket");
    memset(&my_addr, 0, sizeof(my_addr));
    my_addr.sun_family = AF_UNIX;
    strncpy(my_addr.sun_path, MY_SOCK_PATH,
            sizeof(my_addr.sun_path) - 1);
    if (bind(sfd, (struct sockaddr *) &my_addr,
             sizeof(my_addr)) == -1)
        handle_error("bind");
    if (listen(sfd, LISTEN_BACKLOG) == -1)
        handle_error("listen");
    /* Now we can accept incoming connections one
       at a time using accept(2). */
    peer_addr_size = sizeof(peer_addr);
    cfd = accept(sfd, (struct sockaddr *) &peer_addr,
                 &peer_addr_size);
    if (cfd == -1)
        handle_error("accept");
    /* Code to deal with incoming connection(s)... */
    if (close(sfd) == -1)
        handle_error("close");
    if (unlink(MY_SOCK_PATH) == -1)
        handle_error("unlink");
}

accept(2), connect(2), getsockname(2), listen(2), socket(2), getaddrinfo(3), getifaddrs(3), ip(7), ipv6(7), path_resolution(7), socket(7), unix(7)