NAME

       sd_bus_message_open_container, sd_bus_message_close_container, sd_bus_message_enter_container,
       sd_bus_message_exit_container - Create and move between containers in D-Bus messages

SYNOPSIS

       #include <systemd/sd-bus.h>

       int sd_bus_message_open_container(sd_bus_message *m, char type, const char *contents);

       int sd_bus_message_close_container(sd_bus_message *m);

       int sd_bus_message_enter_container(sd_bus_message *m, char type, const char *contents);

       int sd_bus_message_exit_container(sd_bus_message *m);

DESCRIPTION

       sd_bus_message_open_container() appends a new container to the message m. After opening a new container,
       it can be filled with content using sd_bus_message_append(3) and similar functions. Containers behave
       like a stack. To nest containers inside each other, call sd_bus_message_open_container() multiple times
       without calling sd_bus_message_close_container() in between. Each container will be nested inside the
       previous container.  type represents the container type and should be one of "r", "a", "v" or "e" as
       described in sd_bus_message_append(3). Instead of literals, the corresponding constants
       SD_BUS_TYPE_STRUCT, SD_BUS_TYPE_ARRAY, SD_BUS_TYPE_VARIANT or SD_BUS_TYPE_DICT_ENTRY can also be used.
       contents describes the type of the container's elements and should be a D-Bus type string following the
       rules described in sd_bus_message_append(3).

       sd_bus_message_close_container() closes the last container opened with sd_bus_message_open_container().
       On success, the write pointer of the message m is positioned after the closed container in its parent
       container or in m itself if there is no parent container.

       sd_bus_message_enter_container() enters the next container of the message m for reading. It behaves
       mostly the same as sd_bus_message_open_container(). Entering a container allows reading its contents with
       sd_bus_message_read(3) and similar functions.  type and contents are the same as in
       sd_bus_message_open_container().

       sd_bus_message_exit_container() exits the scope of the last container entered with
       sd_bus_message_enter_container(). It behaves mostly the same as sd_bus_message_close_container(). Note
       that sd_bus_message_exit_container() may only be called after iterating through all members of the
       container, i.e. reading or skipping over them. Use sd_bus_message_skip(3) to skip over fields of a
       container in order to be able to exit the container with sd_bus_message_exit_container() without reading
       all members.

RETURN VALUE

       On success, these functions return a non-negative integer.  sd_bus_message_open_container() and
       sd_bus_message_close_container() return 0.  sd_bus_message_enter_container() returns 1 if it successfully
       opened a new container, and 0 if that was not possible because the end of the currently open container or
       message was reached.  sd_bus_message_exit_container() returns 1 on success. On failure, all of these
       functions return a negative errno-style error code.

   Errors
       Returned errors may indicate the following problems:

       -EINVAL
           m or contents are NULL or type is invalid.

           Added in version 246.

       -EBADMSG
           Message m has invalid structure.

           Added in version 254.

       -ENXIO
           Message m does not have a container of type type at the current position, or the contents do not
           match contents.

           Added in version 254.

       -EPERM
           The message m is already sealed.

           Added in version 246.

       -ESTALE
           The message m is in an invalid state.

           Added in version 246.

       -ENOMEM
           Memory allocation failed.

           Added in version 246.

       -EBUSY
           sd_bus_message_exit_container() was called but there are unread members left in the container.

           Added in version 247.

NOTES

       Functions described here are available as a shared library, which can be compiled against and linked to
       with the libsystemd pkg-config(1) file.

       The code described here uses getenv(3), which is declared to be not multi-thread-safe. This means that
       the code calling the functions described here must not call setenv(3) from a parallel thread. It is
       recommended to only do calls to setenv() from an early phase of the program when no other threads have
       been started.

EXAMPLES

       Example 1. Append an array of strings to a message

           /* SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT-0 */

           #include <systemd/sd-bus.h>

           int append_strings_to_message(sd_bus_message *m, const char *const *arr) {
             int r;

             r = sd_bus_message_open_container(m, 'a', "s");
             if (r < 0)
               return r;

             for (const char *s = *arr; *s; s++) {
               r = sd_bus_message_append(m, "s", s);
               if (r < 0)
                 return r;
             }

             return sd_bus_message_close_container(m);
           }

       Example 2. Read an array of strings from a message

           /* SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT-0 */

           #include <stdio.h>

           #include <systemd/sd-bus.h>

           int read_strings_from_message(sd_bus_message *m) {
             int r;

             r = sd_bus_message_enter_container(m, 'a', "s");
             if (r < 0)
               return r;

             for (;;) {
               const char *s;

               r = sd_bus_message_read(m, "s", &s);
               if (r < 0)
                 return r;
               if (r == 0)
                 break;

               printf("%s\n", s);
             }

             return sd_bus_message_exit_container(m);
           }

SEE ALSO

       systemd(1), sd-bus(3), sd_bus_message_append(3), sd_bus_message_read(3), sd_bus_message_skip(3), The
       D-Bus specification[1]

NOTES

        1. The D-Bus specification
           https://dbus.freedesktop.org/doc/dbus-specification.html