NAME

       sendfile - transfer data between file descriptors

SYNOPSIS

       #include <sys/sendfile.h>

       ssize_t sendfile(int out_fd, int in_fd, off_t *offset, size_t count);

DESCRIPTION

       sendfile()  copies data between one file descriptor and another.  Because this copying is done within the
       kernel, sendfile() is more efficient than the combination of read(2) and write(2),  which  would  require
       transferring data to and from user space.

       in_fd  should  be  a  file  descriptor  opened  for  reading and out_fd should be a descriptor opened for
       writing.

       If offset is not NULL, then it points to a variable holding the file offset from  which  sendfile()  will
       start  reading  data from in_fd.  When sendfile() returns, this variable will be set to the offset of the
       byte following the last byte that was read.  If offset is not NULL, then sendfile() does not  modify  the
       file  offset  of  in_fd;  otherwise  the file offset is adjusted to reflect the number of bytes read from
       in_fd.

       If offset is NULL, then data will be read from in_fd starting at the file offset,  and  the  file  offset
       will be updated by the call.

       count is the number of bytes to copy between the file descriptors.

       The in_fd argument must correspond to a file which supports mmap(2)-like operations (i.e., it cannot be a
       socket).

       In Linux kernels before 2.6.33, out_fd must refer to a socket.  Since Linux 2.6.33 it can  be  any  file.
       If it is a regular file, then sendfile() changes the file offset appropriately.

RETURN VALUE

       If  the  transfer  was  successful,  the  number  of  bytes  written  to out_fd is returned.  Note that a
       successful call to sendfile() may write fewer bytes than requested; the  caller  should  be  prepared  to
       retry the call if there were unsent bytes.  See also NOTES.

       On error, -1 is returned, and errno is set appropriately.

ERRORS

       EAGAIN Nonblocking I/O has been selected using O_NONBLOCK and the write would block.

       EBADF  The input file was not opened for reading or the output file was not opened for writing.

       EFAULT Bad address.

       EINVAL Descriptor  is  not  valid  or locked, or an mmap(2)-like operation is not available for in_fd, or
              count is negative.

       EINVAL out_fd has the O_APPEND flag set.  This is not currently supported by sendfile().

       EIO    Unspecified error while reading from in_fd.

       ENOMEM Insufficient memory to read from in_fd.

       EOVERFLOW
              count is too large, the operation would result in exceeding the maximum size of either  the  input
              file or the output file.

       ESPIPE offset is not NULL but the input file is not seekable.

VERSIONS

       sendfile() first appeared in Linux 2.2.  The include file <sys/sendfile.h> is present since glibc 2.1.

CONFORMING TO

       Not specified in POSIX.1-2001, nor in other standards.

       Other  UNIX  systems implement sendfile() with different semantics and prototypes.  It should not be used
       in portable programs.

NOTES

       sendfile() will transfer at most 0x7ffff000 (2,147,479,552) bytes, returning the number of bytes actually
       transferred.  (This is true on both 32-bit and 64-bit systems.)

       If  you  plan  to  use sendfile() for sending files to a TCP socket, but need to send some header data in
       front of the file contents, you will find it useful to employ the TCP_CORK option, described  in  tcp(7),
       to minimize the number of packets and to tune performance.

       In  Linux  2.4  and earlier, out_fd could also refer to a regular file; this possibility went away in the
       Linux 2.6.x kernel series, but was restored in Linux 2.6.33.

       The original Linux sendfile() system call was not designed to handle large file  offsets.   Consequently,
       Linux  2.4  added  sendfile64(), with a wider type for the offset argument.  The glibc sendfile() wrapper
       function transparently deals with the kernel differences.

       Applications may wish to fall back to read(2)/write(2) in the case where sendfile() fails with EINVAL  or
       ENOSYS.

       If out_fd refers to a socket or pipe with zero-copy support, callers must ensure the transferred portions
       of the file referred to by in_fd remain unmodified until the reader  on  the  other  end  of  out_fd  has
       consumed the transferred data.

       The  Linux-specific splice(2) call supports transferring data between arbitrary file descriptors provided
       one (or both) of them is a pipe.

SEE ALSO

       copy_file_range(2), mmap(2), open(2), socket(2), splice(2)

COLOPHON

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