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PROLOG
This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual. The Linux implementation of
this interface may differ (consult the corresponding Linux manual page for details of
Linux behavior), or the interface may not be implemented on Linux.
NAME
sendto — send a message on a socket
SYNOPSIS
#include <sys/socket.h>
ssize_t sendto(int socket, const void *message, size_t length,
int flags, const struct sockaddr *dest_addr,
socklen_t dest_len);
DESCRIPTION
The sendto() function shall send a message through a connection-mode or connectionless-
mode socket.
If the socket is a connectionless-mode socket, the message shall be sent to the address
specified by dest_addr if no pre-specified peer address has been set. If a peer address
has been pre-specified, either the message shall be sent to the address specified by
dest_addr (overriding the pre-specified peer address), or the function shall return −1 and
set errno to [EISCONN].
If the socket is connection-mode, dest_addr shall be ignored.
The sendto() function takes the following arguments:
socket Specifies the socket file descriptor.
message Points to a buffer containing the message to be sent.
length Specifies the size of the message in bytes.
flags Specifies the type of message transmission. Values of this argument are formed
by logically OR'ing zero or more of the following flags:
MSG_EOR Terminates a record (if supported by the protocol).
MSG_OOB Sends out-of-band data on sockets that support out-of-band data.
The significance and semantics of out-of-band data are protocol-
specific.
MSG_NOSIGNAL Requests not to send the SIGPIPE signal if an attempt to send is
made on a stream-oriented socket that is no longer connected.
The [EPIPE] error shall still be returned.
dest_addr Points to a sockaddr structure containing the destination address. The length
and format of the address depend on the address family of the socket.
dest_len Specifies the length of the sockaddr structure pointed to by the dest_addr
argument.
If the socket protocol supports broadcast and the specified address is a broadcast address
for the socket protocol, sendto() shall fail if the SO_BROADCAST option is not set for the
socket.
The dest_addr argument specifies the address of the target.
The length argument specifies the length of the message.
Successful completion of a call to sendto() does not guarantee delivery of the message. A
return value of −1 indicates only locally-detected errors.
If space is not available at the sending socket to hold the message to be transmitted and
the socket file descriptor does not have O_NONBLOCK set, sendto() shall block until space
is available. If space is not available at the sending socket to hold the message to be
transmitted and the socket file descriptor does have O_NONBLOCK set, sendto() shall fail.
The socket in use may require the process to have appropriate privileges to use the
sendto() function.
RETURN VALUE
Upon successful completion, sendto() shall return the number of bytes sent. Otherwise, −1
shall be returned and errno set to indicate the error.
ERRORS
The sendto() function shall fail if:
EAFNOSUPPORT
Addresses in the specified address family cannot be used with this socket.
EAGAIN or EWOULDBLOCK
The socket's file descriptor is marked O_NONBLOCK and the requested operation would
block.
EBADF The socket argument is not a valid file descriptor.
ECONNRESET
A connection was forcibly closed by a peer.
EINTR A signal interrupted sendto() before any data was transmitted.
EMSGSIZE
The message is too large to be sent all at once, as the socket requires.
ENOTCONN
The socket is connection-mode but is not connected.
ENOTSOCK
The socket argument does not refer to a socket.
EOPNOTSUPP
The socket argument is associated with a socket that does not support one or more
of the values set in flags.
EPIPE The socket is shut down for writing, or the socket is connection-mode and is no
longer connected. In the latter case, and if the socket is of type SOCK_STREAM or
SOCK_SEQPACKET and the MSG_NOSIGNAL flag is not set, the SIGPIPE signal is
generated to the calling thread.
If the address family of the socket is AF_UNIX, then sendto() shall fail if:
EIO An I/O error occurred while reading from or writing to the file system.
ELOOP A loop exists in symbolic links encountered during resolution of the pathname in
the socket address.
ENAMETOOLONG
The length of a component of a pathname is longer than {NAME_MAX}.
ENOENT A component of the pathname does not name an existing file or the pathname is an
empty string.
ENOTDIR
A component of the path prefix of the pathname in the socket address names an
existing file that is neither a directory nor a symbolic link to a directory, or
the pathname in the socket address contains at least one non-<slash> character and
ends with one or more trailing <slash> characters and the last pathname component
names an existing file that is neither a directory nor a symbolic link to a
directory.
The sendto() function may fail if:
EACCES Search permission is denied for a component of the path prefix; or write access to
the named socket is denied.
EDESTADDRREQ
The socket is not connection-mode and does not have its peer address set, and no
destination address was specified.
EHOSTUNREACH
The destination host cannot be reached (probably because the host is down or a
remote router cannot reach it).
EINVAL The dest_len argument is not a valid length for the address family.
EIO An I/O error occurred while reading from or writing to the file system.
EISCONN
A destination address was specified and the socket is already connected.
ENETDOWN
The local network interface used to reach the destination is down.
ENETUNREACH
No route to the network is present.
ENOBUFS
Insufficient resources were available in the system to perform the operation.
ENOMEM Insufficient memory was available to fulfill the request.
If the address family of the socket is AF_UNIX, then sendto() may fail if:
ELOOP More than {SYMLOOP_MAX} symbolic links were encountered during resolution of the
pathname in the socket address.
ENAMETOOLONG
The length of a pathname exceeds {PATH_MAX}, or pathname resolution of a symbolic
link produced an intermediate result with a length that exceeds {PATH_MAX}.
The following sections are informative.
EXAMPLES
None.
APPLICATION USAGE
The select() and poll() functions can be used to determine when it is possible to send
more data.
RATIONALE
None.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
None.
SEE ALSO
getsockopt(), poll(), pselect(), recv(), recvfrom(), recvmsg(), send(), sendmsg(),
setsockopt(), shutdown(), socket()
The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, <sys_socket.h>
COPYRIGHT
Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form from IEEE Std
1003.1, 2013 Edition, Standard for Information Technology -- Portable Operating System
Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 7, Copyright (C) 2013 by the
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. (This is
POSIX.1-2008 with the 2013 Technical Corrigendum 1 applied.) In the event of any
discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard, the
original IEEE and The Open Group Standard is the referee document. The original Standard
can be obtained online at http://www.unix.org/online.html .
Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page are most likely to have
been introduced during the conversion of the source files to man page format. To report
such errors, see https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .