Copyright (c) 1999 The NetBSD Foundation, Inc.
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by Klaus Klein.
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.Dd September 13, 1999 .Dt ULIMIT 3 .Os .Sh NAME .Nm ulimit .Nd get and set process limits .Sh LIBRARY .Lb libc .Sh SYNOPSIS .Fd #include <ulimit.h> .Ft long int .Fn ulimit "int cmd" ... .Sh DESCRIPTION The .Fn ulimit function provides a method to query or alter resource limits of the calling process. The method to be performed is specified by the .Fa cmd argument; possible values are: l -tag -width UL_GETFSIZEXX t Li UL_GETFSIZE Return the soft file size limit of the process. The value returned is in units of 512-byte blocks. If the result cannot be represented in an object of type .Fa long int , the result is unspecified. t Li UL_SETFSIZE Set the hard and soft file size limits of the process to the value of the second argument passed, which is in units of 512-byte blocks, and which is expected to be of type .Fa long int . The new file size limit of the process is returned. Any process may decrease the limit, but raising it is only permitted if the caller is the super-user. .El
p If successful, the .Fn ulimit function will not change the setting of .Va errno .
p The .Fn ulimit function is an obsolete interface; applications are encouraged to use .Xr getrlimit 2 and .Xr setrlimit 2 instead. .Sh RETURN VALUE If successful, the .Fn ulimit function returns the value of the requested limit. Otherwise, it returns -1, sets .Va errno to indicate an error, and the limit is not changed. Therefore, to detect an error condition applications should set .Va errno to 0, call .Fn ulimit , and check if -1 is returned and .Va errno is non-zero. .Sh ERRORS The .Fn ulimit function will fail if: l -tag -width Er t Bq Er EINVAL The .Fa cmd argument is not valid. t Bq Er EPERM It was attempted to increase a limit, and the caller is not the super-user. .El .Sh SEE ALSO .Xr getrlimit 2 , .Xr setrlimit 2 .Sh STANDARDS The .Fn ulimit function conforms to .St -xsh5 .
Indexes created Mon Nov 03 11:09:54 GMT 2025