• NAME
  
  mkfifo - make a FIFO special file (a named pipe)
• SYNOPSIS
  

  
   #include <sys/types.h>
   #include <sys/stat.h>
  
   int mkfifo(const char * pathname , mode_t  mode );
  

• DESCRIPTION
  
  mkfifo ()
  makes a FIFO special file with name pathname.
  mode specifies the FIFO's permissions.
  It is modified by the
  process's umask in the usual way: the permissions of the created
  file are (mode & ~umask).
  
  
  
  A FIFO special file is similar to a pipe, except that it is created
  in a different way.
  Instead of being an anonymous communications
  channel, a FIFO special file is entered into the file system by
  calling
  mkfifo ().
  
  
  
  Once you have created a FIFO special file in this way, any process can
  open it for reading or writing, in the same way as an ordinary file.
  However, it has to be open at both ends simultaneously before you can
  proceed to do any input or output operations on it.
  Opening a FIFO for reading normally blocks until some
  other process opens the same FIFO for writing, and vice versa.
  See
  fifo(7)
  for non-blocking handling of FIFO special files.
  
• RETURN VALUE
  
  On success
  mkfifo ()
  returns 0.
  In the case of an error, -1 is returned (in which case, errno
  is set appropriately).
  
• ERRORS
  

  EACCES

  One of the directories in pathname did not allow search
  (execute) permission.
  

  EEXIST

  pathname already exists.
  This includes the case where
  pathname
  is a symbolic link, dangling or not.
  

  ENAMETOOLONG

  Either the total length of pathname is greater than
  PATH_MAX, or an individual filename component has a length
  greater than NAME_MAX.
  In the GNU system, there is no imposed
  limit on overall filename length, but some file systems may place
  limits on the length of a component.
  

  ENOENT

  A directory component in pathname does not exist or is a
  dangling symbolic link.
  

  ENOSPC

  The directory or file system has no room for the new file.
  

  ENOTDIR

  A component used as a directory in pathname is not, in fact, a
  directory.
  

  EROFS

  pathname refers to a read-only file system.
  

• CONFORMING TO
  
  POSIX.1-2001.
  
• SEE ALSO
  
  mkfifo(1) ,
  close(2) ,
  open(2) ,
  read(2) ,
  stat(2) ,
  umask(2) ,
  write(2) ,
  mkfifoat(3) ,
  fifo(7)
  
• COLOPHON
  
  This page is part of release 3.19 of the Linux
  man-pages
  project.
  A description of the project,
  and information about reporting bugs,
  can be found at
  http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.
  

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