NAME

       close - Close an open channel

SYNOPSIS

       close channelId
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DESCRIPTION

       Closes the channel given by channelId.

       ChannelId must be an identifier for an open channel such as a Tcl standard channel (stdin,
       stdout, or stderr), the return value from an invocation of open or socket, or  the  result
       of a channel creation command provided by a Tcl extension.

       All  buffered  output  is  flushed  to  the channel's output device, any buffered input is
       discarded, the underlying file or device is closed, and channelId becomes unavailable  for
       use.

       If  the  channel is blocking, the command does not return until all output is flushed.  If
       the channel is nonblocking and there is unflushed output, the channel remains open and the
       command returns immediately; output will be flushed in the background and the channel will
       be closed when all the flushing is complete.

       If channelId is a blocking channel for a command pipeline then close waits for  the  child
       processes to complete.

       If  the  channel is shared between interpreters, then close makes channelId unavailable in
       the invoking interpreter but has no other effect until all  of  the  sharing  interpreters
       have  closed  the  channel.   When the last interpreter in which the channel is registered
       invokes close, the cleanup actions described above occur. See the  interp  command  for  a
       description of channel sharing.

       Channels  are  automatically  closed when an interpreter is destroyed and when the process
       exits.  Channels are switched to blocking mode, to ensure that  all  output  is  correctly
       flushed before the process exits.

       The  command  returns  an empty string, and may generate an error if an error occurs while
       flushing output.  If a command in a command pipeline created with open returns  an  error,
       close generates an error (similar to the exec command.)

EXAMPLE

       This  illustrates  how  you  can  use Tcl to ensure that files get closed even when errors
       happen by combining catch, close and return:
              proc withOpenFile {filename channelVar script} {
                  upvar 1 $channelVar chan
                  set chan [open $filename]
                  catch {
                      uplevel 1 $script
                  } result options
                  close $chan
                  return -options $options $result
              }

SEE ALSO

       file(3tcl), open(3tcl), socket(3tcl), eof(3tcl), Tcl_StandardChannels(3tcl)

KEYWORDS

       blocking, channel, close, nonblocking