rename.2 (2010 09)

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rename(2) rename(2)
NAME
rename - change the name of a file
SYNOPSIS
#include <stdio.h>
int rename(const char *source, const char *target);
DESCRIPTION
The rename() system call causes the source file to be renamed to target .Iftarget exists, it is first
removed. Both source and target must be of the same type (that is, either directories or nondirectories),
and must reside on the same file system.
If target can be created or if it existed before the call,
rename() guarantees that an instance of target
will exist, even if the system crashes in the midst of the operation.
If the final component of source is a symbolic link, the symbolic link is renamed, not the file or directory
to which the symbolic link points.
RETURN VALUE
rename() returns the following values:
0 Successful completion.
-1 Failure. Neither file is affected. errno
is set to indicate the error.
ERRORS
If
rename() fails, errno is set to one of the following values.
[EACCES] A component of either path prefix denies search permission.
[EACCES] The requested link requires writing to a directory without write permission.
[EBUSY] target or source is an existing directory that is the mount point for a mounted file
system.
[EDQUOT] User’s disk quota block or inode limit has been reached for this file system.
[EEXIST] target is a directory and is not empty.
[EFAULT] source or target points outside the allocated address space of the process. Reliable
detection of this error is implementation dependent.
[EINVAL] source is a parent directory of target , or an attempt is made to rename the
. or ..
directory.
[EISDIR] target is a directory, but source is not.
[ELOOP] Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating either path name.
[ENAMETOOLONG]
A component of either path name exceeds
NAME_MAX bytes while
_POSIX_NO_TRUNC is in effect, or the entire length of either path name exceeds
PATH_MAX bytes.
[ENOENT] A component of the source path does not exist, or a path prefix of target does not
exist.
[ENOSPC] The destination directory cannot be extended because of a lack of space on the file
system containing the directory.
[ENOTDIR] A component of either path prefix is not a directory.
[ENOTDIR] source is a directory, but target is not.
[EPERM] The directory containing source has the sticky bit set, and neither the containing
directory nor the source are owned by the effective user ID.
[EPERM] The target file exists, the directory containing target has the sticky bit set, and nei-
ther the containing directory nor the target are owned by the effective user ID.
[EROFS] The requested link requires writing in a directory on a read-only file system.
[EXDEV] The paths named by source and target are on different logical devices (file systems).
HP-UX 11i Version 3: September 2010 − 1 − Hewlett-Packard Company 1