NAME

       pmParseInterval, pmParseHighResInterval - convert interval string to binary time structure

C SYNOPSIS

       #include <pcp/pmapi.h>

       int pmParseInterval(const char *string, struct timeval *urslt, char **errmsg);
       int pmParseHighResInterval(const char *string, struct timespec *nrslt, char **errmsg);

       cc ... -lpcp

DESCRIPTION

       pmParseInterval parses the argument string specifying an interval of time and fills in the
       tv_sec  and  tv_usec  components  of  the  urslt  structure  to  represent  that  interval
       (microsecond precision).

       Similary,  pmParseHighResInterval  parses  the argument string and fills in the tv_sec and
       tv_nsec  components  of  the  nrslt  structure  to  represent  that  interval  (nanosecond
       precision).

       The input string is most commonly the argument following a -t command line option to a PCP
       application, and the syntax is fully described in PCPIntro(1).

DIAGNOSTICS

       pmParseInterval returns 0 and errmsg is undefined if the parsing is successful.

       If the given string does not conform to the required syntax pmParseInterval returns -1 and
       a  dynamically  allocated error message string in errmsg.  The error message is terminated
       with a newline and includes the text of the input string along with an  indicator  of  the
       position at which the error was detected, e.g.
                 4minutes 30mumble
                            ^ -- unexpected value

       In  the  case  of  an  error, the caller is responsible for calling free(3) to release the
       space allocated for errmsg.

SEE ALSO

       PCPIntro(1), free(3), PMAPI(3) and pmParseTimeWindow(3).