Name: execve()
|
System call or function: System Call |
Links: Online Manual | Course Packet |
What it does: Replaces the code of the program that calls execve()
with a new code at location path
, and passes the arguments argv
to that invoked program. |
What libraries you must include: #include <unistd.h> // Defines execve().
|
Syntax: int execve (const char *path, char *const argv[], char *const envp[]);
|
Description of arguments: path
: the location on disk where the code of the program you want to call is stored
argv
: an array of command-line argument strings that will be passed to the new program
envp
: an array of pointers to strings of the form key=value, representing the environment of the new program. |
What type it returns: int
|
On success: It doesn't return: instead, the current program is replaced by the new program. |
On failure: -1
|
If failure, does it set errno
? Yes |
Quick example: execve ("/bin/ls", newargv, newenviron);
perror ("execve"); /* execve() returns only on error */
|
Other variations: execv()
, execvp()
, execle()
, execl()
, execlp()
|
These notes by Miriam Briskman are licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0 and based on sources.