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NAME
timerfd_create, timerfd_settime, timerfd_gettime - timers that notify via file descriptors
LIBRARY
Standard C library (libc, -lc)
SYNOPSIS
#include <sys/timerfd.h>
int timerfd_create(int clockid, int flags);
int timerfd_settime(int fd, int flags,
const struct itimerspec *new_value,
struct itimerspec *_Nullable old_value);
int timerfd_gettime(int fd, struct itimerspec *curr_value);
DESCRIPTION
These system calls create and operate on a timer that delivers timer expiration
notifications via a file descriptor. They provide an alternative to the use of
setitimer(2) or timer_create(2), with the advantage that the file descriptor may be
monitored by select(2), poll(2), and epoll(7).
The use of these three system calls is analogous to the use of timer_create(2),
timer_settime(2), and timer_gettime(2). (There is no analog of timer_getoverrun(2), since
that functionality is provided by read(2), as described below.)
timerfd_create()
timerfd_create() creates a new timer object, and returns a file descriptor that refers to
that timer. The clockid argument specifies the clock that is used to mark the progress of
the timer, and must be one of the following:
CLOCK_REALTIME
A settable system-wide real-time clock.
CLOCK_MONOTONIC
A nonsettable monotonically increasing clock that measures time from some
unspecified point in the past that does not change after system startup.
CLOCK_BOOTTIME (Since Linux 3.15)
Like CLOCK_MONOTONIC, this is a monotonically increasing clock. However, whereas
the CLOCK_MONOTONIC clock does not measure the time while a system is suspended,
the CLOCK_BOOTTIME clock does include the time during which the system is
suspended. This is useful for applications that need to be suspend-aware.
CLOCK_REALTIME is not suitable for such applications, since that clock is affected
by discontinuous changes to the system clock.
CLOCK_REALTIME_ALARM (since Linux 3.11)
This clock is like CLOCK_REALTIME, but will wake the system if it is suspended.
The caller must have the CAP_WAKE_ALARM capability in order to set a timer against
this clock.
CLOCK_BOOTTIME_ALARM (since Linux 3.11)
This clock is like CLOCK_BOOTTIME, but will wake the system if it is suspended.
The caller must have the CAP_WAKE_ALARM capability in order to set a timer against
this clock.
See clock_getres(2) for some further details on the above clocks.
The current value of each of these clocks can be retrieved using clock_gettime(2).
Starting with Linux 2.6.27, the following values may be bitwise ORed in flags to change
the behavior of timerfd_create():
TFD_NONBLOCK Set the O_NONBLOCK file status flag on the open file description (see
open(2)) referred to by the new file descriptor. Using this flag saves
extra calls to fcntl(2) to achieve the same result.
TFD_CLOEXEC Set the close-on-exec (FD_CLOEXEC) flag on the new file descriptor. See the
description of the O_CLOEXEC flag in open(2) for reasons why this may be
useful.
In Linux versions up to and including 2.6.26, flags must be specified as zero.
timerfd_settime()
timerfd_settime() arms (starts) or disarms (stops) the timer referred to by the file
descriptor fd.
The new_value argument specifies the initial expiration and interval for the timer. The
itimerspec structure used for this argument is described in itimerspec(3type).
new_value.it_value specifies the initial expiration of the timer, in seconds and
nanoseconds. Setting either field of new_value.it_value to a nonzero value arms the
timer. Setting both fields of new_value.it_value to zero disarms the timer.
Setting one or both fields of new_value.it_interval to nonzero values specifies the
period, in seconds and nanoseconds, for repeated timer expirations after the initial
expiration. If both fields of new_value.it_interval are zero, the timer expires just
once, at the time specified by new_value.it_value.
By default, the initial expiration time specified in new_value is interpreted relative to
the current time on the timer's clock at the time of the call (i.e., new_value.it_value
specifies a time relative to the current value of the clock specified by clockid). An
absolute timeout can be selected via the flags argument.
The flags argument is a bit mask that can include the following values:
TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME
Interpret new_value.it_value as an absolute value on the timer's clock. The timer
will expire when the value of the timer's clock reaches the value specified in
new_value.it_value.
TFD_TIMER_CANCEL_ON_SET
If this flag is specified along with TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME and the clock for this timer
is CLOCK_REALTIME or CLOCK_REALTIME_ALARM, then mark this timer as cancelable if
the real-time clock undergoes a discontinuous change (settimeofday(2),
clock_settime(2), or similar). When such changes occur, a current or future
read(2) from the file descriptor will fail with the error ECANCELED.
If the old_value argument is not NULL, then the itimerspec structure that it points to is
used to return the setting of the timer that was current at the time of the call; see the
description of timerfd_gettime() following.
timerfd_gettime()
timerfd_gettime() returns, in curr_value, an itimerspec structure that contains the
current setting of the timer referred to by the file descriptor fd.
The it_value field returns the amount of time until the timer will next expire. If both
fields of this structure are zero, then the timer is currently disarmed. This field
always contains a relative value, regardless of whether the TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME flag was
specified when setting the timer.
The it_interval field returns the interval of the timer. If both fields of this structure
are zero, then the timer is set to expire just once, at the time specified by
curr_value.it_value.
Operating on a timer file descriptor
The file descriptor returned by timerfd_create() supports the following additional
operations:
read(2)
If the timer has already expired one or more times since its settings were last
modified using timerfd_settime(), or since the last successful read(2), then the
buffer given to read(2) returns an unsigned 8-byte integer (uint64_t) containing
the number of expirations that have occurred. (The returned value is in host byte
order—that is, the native byte order for integers on the host machine.)
If no timer expirations have occurred at the time of the read(2), then the call
either blocks until the next timer expiration, or fails with the error EAGAIN if
the file descriptor has been made nonblocking (via the use of the fcntl(2) F_SETFL
operation to set the O_NONBLOCK flag).
A read(2) fails with the error EINVAL if the size of the supplied buffer is less
than 8 bytes.
If the associated clock is either CLOCK_REALTIME or CLOCK_REALTIME_ALARM, the timer
is absolute (TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME), and the flag TFD_TIMER_CANCEL_ON_SET was specified
when calling timerfd_settime(), then read(2) fails with the error ECANCELED if the
real-time clock undergoes a discontinuous change. (This allows the reading
application to discover such discontinuous changes to the clock.)
If the associated clock is either CLOCK_REALTIME or CLOCK_REALTIME_ALARM, the timer
is absolute (TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME), and the flag TFD_TIMER_CANCEL_ON_SET was not
specified when calling timerfd_settime(), then a discontinuous negative change to
the clock (e.g., clock_settime(2)) may cause read(2) to unblock, but return a value
of 0 (i.e., no bytes read), if the clock change occurs after the time expired, but
before the read(2) on the file descriptor.
poll(2), select(2) (and similar)
The file descriptor is readable (the select(2) readfds argument; the poll(2) POLLIN
flag) if one or more timer expirations have occurred.
The file descriptor also supports the other file-descriptor multiplexing APIs:
pselect(2), ppoll(2), and epoll(7).
ioctl(2)
The following timerfd-specific command is supported:
TFD_IOC_SET_TICKS (since Linux 3.17)
Adjust the number of timer expirations that have occurred. The argument is
a pointer to a nonzero 8-byte integer (uint64_t*) containing the new number
of expirations. Once the number is set, any waiter on the timer is woken
up. The only purpose of this command is to restore the expirations for the
purpose of checkpoint/restore. This operation is available only if the
kernel was configured with the CONFIG_CHECKPOINT_RESTORE option.
close(2)
When the file descriptor is no longer required it should be closed. When all file
descriptors associated with the same timer object have been closed, the timer is
disarmed and its resources are freed by the kernel.
fork(2) semantics
After a fork(2), the child inherits a copy of the file descriptor created by
timerfd_create(). The file descriptor refers to the same underlying timer object as the
corresponding file descriptor in the parent, and read(2)s in the child will return
information about expirations of the timer.
execve(2) semantics
A file descriptor created by timerfd_create() is preserved across execve(2), and continues
to generate timer expirations if the timer was armed.
RETURN VALUE
On success, timerfd_create() returns a new file descriptor. On error, -1 is returned and
errno is set to indicate the error.
timerfd_settime() and timerfd_gettime() return 0 on success; on error they return -1, and
set errno to indicate the error.
ERRORS
timerfd_create() can fail with the following errors:
EINVAL The clockid is not valid.
EINVAL flags is invalid; or, in Linux 2.6.26 or earlier, flags is nonzero.
EMFILE The per-process limit on the number of open file descriptors has been reached.
ENFILE The system-wide limit on the total number of open files has been reached.
ENODEV Could not mount (internal) anonymous inode device.
ENOMEM There was insufficient kernel memory to create the timer.
EPERM clockid was CLOCK_REALTIME_ALARM or CLOCK_BOOTTIME_ALARM but the caller did not
have the CAP_WAKE_ALARM capability.
timerfd_settime() and timerfd_gettime() can fail with the following errors:
EBADF fd is not a valid file descriptor.
EFAULT new_value, old_value, or curr_value is not a valid pointer.
EINVAL fd is not a valid timerfd file descriptor.
timerfd_settime() can also fail with the following errors:
ECANCELED
See NOTES.
EINVAL new_value is not properly initialized (one of the tv_nsec falls outside the range
zero to 999,999,999).
EINVAL flags is invalid.
VERSIONS
These system calls are available since Linux 2.6.25. Library support is provided since
glibc 2.8.
STANDARDS
These system calls are Linux-specific.
NOTES
Suppose the following scenario for CLOCK_REALTIME or CLOCK_REALTIME_ALARM timer that was
created with timerfd_create():
(1) The timer has been started (timerfd_settime()) with the TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME and
TFD_TIMER_CANCEL_ON_SET flags;
(2) A discontinuous change (e.g., settimeofday(2)) is subsequently made to the
CLOCK_REALTIME clock; and
(3) the caller once more calls timerfd_settime() to rearm the timer (without first doing
a read(2) on the file descriptor).
In this case the following occurs:
• The timerfd_settime() returns -1 with errno set to ECANCELED. (This enables the caller
to know that the previous timer was affected by a discontinuous change to the clock.)
• The timer is successfully rearmed with the settings provided in the second
timerfd_settime() call. (This was probably an implementation accident, but won't be
fixed now, in case there are applications that depend on this behaviour.)
BUGS
Currently, timerfd_create() supports fewer types of clock IDs than timer_create(2).
EXAMPLES
The following program creates a timer and then monitors its progress. The program accepts
up to three command-line arguments. The first argument specifies the number of seconds
for the initial expiration of the timer. The second argument specifies the interval for
the timer, in seconds. The third argument specifies the number of times the program
should allow the timer to expire before terminating. The second and third command-line
arguments are optional.
The following shell session demonstrates the use of the program:
$ a.out 3 1 100
0.000: timer started
3.000: read: 1; total=1
4.000: read: 1; total=2
^Z # type control-Z to suspend the program
[1]+ Stopped ./timerfd3_demo 3 1 100
$ fg # Resume execution after a few seconds
a.out 3 1 100
9.660: read: 5; total=7
10.000: read: 1; total=8
11.000: read: 1; total=9
^C # type control-C to suspend the program
Program source
#include <err.h>
#include <inttypes.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <sys/timerfd.h>
#include <time.h>
#include <unistd.h>
static void
print_elapsed_time(void)
{
int secs, nsecs;
static int first_call = 1;
struct timespec curr;
static struct timespec start;
if (first_call) {
first_call = 0;
if (clock_gettime(CLOCK_MONOTONIC, &start) == -1)
err(EXIT_FAILURE, "clock_gettime");
}
if (clock_gettime(CLOCK_MONOTONIC, &curr) == -1)
err(EXIT_FAILURE, "clock_gettime");
secs = curr.tv_sec - start.tv_sec;
nsecs = curr.tv_nsec - start.tv_nsec;
if (nsecs < 0) {
secs--;
nsecs += 1000000000;
}
printf("%d.%03d: ", secs, (nsecs + 500000) / 1000000);
}
int
main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
int fd;
ssize_t s;
uint64_t exp, tot_exp, max_exp;
struct timespec now;
struct itimerspec new_value;
if (argc != 2 && argc != 4) {
fprintf(stderr, "%s init-secs [interval-secs max-exp]\n",
argv[0]);
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
if (clock_gettime(CLOCK_REALTIME, &now) == -1)
err(EXIT_FAILURE, "clock_gettime");
/* Create a CLOCK_REALTIME absolute timer with initial
expiration and interval as specified in command line. */
new_value.it_value.tv_sec = now.tv_sec + atoi(argv[1]);
new_value.it_value.tv_nsec = now.tv_nsec;
if (argc == 2) {
new_value.it_interval.tv_sec = 0;
max_exp = 1;
} else {
new_value.it_interval.tv_sec = atoi(argv[2]);
max_exp = atoi(argv[3]);
}
new_value.it_interval.tv_nsec = 0;
fd = timerfd_create(CLOCK_REALTIME, 0);
if (fd == -1)
err(EXIT_FAILURE, "timerfd_create");
if (timerfd_settime(fd, TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME, &new_value, NULL) == -1)
err(EXIT_FAILURE, "timerfd_settime");
print_elapsed_time();
printf("timer started\n");
for (tot_exp = 0; tot_exp < max_exp;) {
s = read(fd, &exp, sizeof(uint64_t));
if (s != sizeof(uint64_t))
err(EXIT_FAILURE, "read");
tot_exp += exp;
print_elapsed_time();
printf("read: %" PRIu64 "; total=%" PRIu64 "\n", exp, tot_exp);
}
exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
}
SEE ALSO
eventfd(2), poll(2), read(2), select(2), setitimer(2), signalfd(2), timer_create(2),
timer_gettime(2), timer_settime(2), timespec(3), epoll(7), time(7)