getsockopt, setsockopt - get and set options on sockets
#include <sys/types.h> /* See NOTES */
#include <sys/socket.h>
int getsockopt(int sockfd, int level, int optname,
void *optval, socklen_t *optlen);
int setsockopt(int sockfd, int level, int optname,
const void *optval, socklen_t optlen);
getsockopt() and setsockopt()
manipulate options for the socket referred to by the file descriptor
sockfd
. Options may exist at multiple protocol levels; they are
always present at the uppermost socket level.
When manipulating socket options, the level at which the option
resides and the name of the option must be specified. To manipulate
options at the sockets API level, level
is specified as
SOL_SOCKET. To manipulate options at any other level
the protocol number of the appropriate protocol controlling the option
is supplied. For example, to indicate that an option is to be
interpreted by the TCP protocol, level
should
be set to the protocol number of TCP; see
getprotoent(3).
The arguments optval
and optlen
are used to access
option values for setsockopt(). For
getsockopt() they identify a buffer in which the value
for the requested option(s) are to be returned. For
getsockopt(), optlen
is a value-result
argument, initially containing the size of the buffer pointed to by
optval
, and modified on return to indicate the actual size of
the value returned. If no option value is to be supplied or returned,
optval
may be NULL.
Optname
and any specified options are passed uninterpreted
to the appropriate protocol module for interpretation. The include file
<sys/socket.h>
contains definitions for socket level
options, described below. Options at other protocol levels vary in
format and name; consult the appropriate entries in section 4 of the
manual.
Most socket-level options utilize an int
argument for
optval
. For setsockopt(), the argument should
be nonzero to enable a boolean option, or zero if the option is to be
disabled.
For a description of the available socket options see socket(7) and the appropriate protocol man pages.
On success, zero is returned for the standard options. On error, -1
is returned, and errno
is set appropriately.
Netfilter allows the programmer to define custom socket options with associated handlers; for such options, the return value on success is the value returned by the handler.
The argument sockfd
is not a valid file descriptor.
The address pointed to by optval
is not in a valid part of
the process address space. For getsockopt(), this error
may also be returned if optlen
is not in a valid part of the
process address space.
optlen
invalid in setsockopt(). In some
cases this error can also occur for an invalid value in optval
(e.g., for the IP_ADD_MEMBERSHIP option described in
ip(7)).
The option is unknown at the level indicated.
The file descriptor sockfd
does not refer to a socket.
POSIX.1-2001, POSIX.1-2008, SVr4, 4.4BSD (these system calls first appeared in 4.2BSD).
POSIX.1 does not require the inclusion of
<sys/types.h>
, and this header file is not required on
Linux. However, some historical (BSD) implementations required this
header file, and portable applications are probably wise to include
it.
For background on the socklen_t
type, see
accept(2).
Several of the socket options should be handled at lower levels of the system.
This page is part of release 5.10 of the Linux man-pages
project. A description of the project, information about reporting bugs,
and the latest version of this page, can be found at
https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.