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PROLOG
This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual. The Linux implementation of
this interface may differ (consult the corresponding Linux manual page for details of
Linux behavior), or the interface may not be implemented on Linux.
NAME
rename, renameat — rename file relative to directory file descriptor
SYNOPSIS
#include <stdio.h>
int rename(const char *old, const char *new);
int renameat(int oldfd, const char *old, int newfd,
const char *new);
DESCRIPTION
For rename(): The functionality described on this reference page is aligned with the ISO C
standard. Any conflict between the requirements described here and the ISO C standard is
unintentional. This volume of POSIX.1‐2008 defers to the ISO C standard.
The rename() function shall change the name of a file. The old argument points to the
pathname of the file to be renamed. The new argument points to the new pathname of the
file. If the new argument does not resolve to an existing directory entry for a file of
type directory and the new argument contains at least one non-<slash> character and ends
with one or more trailing <slash> characters after all symbolic links have been processed,
rename() shall fail.
If either the old or new argument names a symbolic link, rename() shall operate on the
symbolic link itself, and shall not resolve the last component of the argument. If the old
argument and the new argument resolve to either the same existing directory entry or
different directory entries for the same existing file, rename() shall return successfully
and perform no other action.
If the old argument points to the pathname of a file that is not a directory, the new
argument shall not point to the pathname of a directory. If the link named by the new
argument exists, it shall be removed and old renamed to new. In this case, a link named
new shall remain visible to other processes throughout the renaming operation and refer
either to the file referred to by new or old before the operation began. Write access
permission is required for both the directory containing old and the directory containing
new.
If the old argument points to the pathname of a directory, the new argument shall not
point to the pathname of a file that is not a directory. If the directory named by the new
argument exists, it shall be removed and old renamed to new. In this case, a link named
new shall exist throughout the renaming operation and shall refer either to the directory
referred to by new or old before the operation began. If new names an existing directory,
it shall be required to be an empty directory.
If either pathname argument refers to a path whose final component is either dot or dot-
dot, rename() shall fail.
If the old argument points to a pathname of a symbolic link, the symbolic link shall be
renamed. If the new argument points to a pathname of a symbolic link, the symbolic link
shall be removed.
The old pathname shall not name an ancestor directory of the new pathname. Write access
permission is required for the directory containing old and the directory containing new.
If the old argument points to the pathname of a directory, write access permission may be
required for the directory named by old, and, if it exists, the directory named by new.
If the link named by the new argument exists and the file's link count becomes 0 when it
is removed and no process has the file open, the space occupied by the file shall be freed
and the file shall no longer be accessible. If one or more processes have the file open
when the last link is removed, the link shall be removed before rename() returns, but the
removal of the file contents shall be postponed until all references to the file are
closed.
Upon successful completion, rename() shall mark for update the last data modification and
last file status change timestamps of the parent directory of each file.
If the rename() function fails for any reason other than [EIO], any file named by new
shall be unaffected.
The renameat() function shall be equivalent to the rename() function except in the case
where either old or new specifies a relative path. If old is a relative path, the file to
be renamed is located relative to the directory associated with the file descriptor oldfd
instead of the current working directory. If new is a relative path, the same happens only
relative to the directory associated with newfd. If the file descriptor was opened
without O_SEARCH, the function shall check whether directory searches are permitted using
the current permissions of the directory underlying the file descriptor. If the file
descriptor was opened with O_SEARCH, the function shall not perform the check.
If renameat() is passed the special value AT_FDCWD in the oldfd or newfd parameter, the
current working directory shall be used in the determination of the file for the
respective path parameter.
RETURN VALUE
Upon successful completion, the rename() function shall return 0. Otherwise, it shall
return −1, errno shall be set to indicate the error, and neither the file named by old nor
the file named by new shall be changed or created.
Upon successful completion, the renameat() function shall return 0. Otherwise, it shall
return −1 and set errno to indicate the error.
ERRORS
The rename() and renameat() functions shall fail if:
EACCES A component of either path prefix denies search permission; or one of the
directories containing old or new denies write permissions; or, write permission is
required and is denied for a directory pointed to by the old or new arguments.
EBUSY The directory named by old or new is currently in use by the system or another
process, and the implementation considers this an error.
[EEXIST] or [ENOTEMPTY]
The link named by new is a directory that is not an empty directory.
EINVAL The old pathname names an ancestor directory of the new pathname, or either
pathname argument contains a final component that is dot or dot-dot.
EIO A physical I/O error has occurred.
EISDIR The new argument points to a directory and the old argument points to a file
that is not a directory.
ELOOP A loop exists in symbolic links encountered during resolution of the path
argument.
EMLINK The file named by old is a directory, and the link count of the parent
directory of new would exceed {LINK_MAX}.
ENAMETOOLONG
The length of a component of a pathname is longer than {NAME_MAX}.
ENOENT The link named by old does not name an existing file, a component of the path
prefix of new does not exist, or either old or new points to an empty string.
ENOSPC The directory that would contain new cannot be extended.
ENOTDIR A component of either path prefix names an existing file that is neither a
directory nor a symbolic link to a directory; or the old argument names a
directory and the new argument names a non-directory file; or the old argument
contains at least one non-<slash> character and ends with one or more trailing
<slash> characters and the last pathname component names an existing file that
is neither a directory nor a symbolic link to a directory; or the old argument
names an existing non-directory file and the new argument names a nonexistent
file, contains at least one non-<slash> character, and ends with one or more
trailing <slash> characters; or the new argument names an existing non-
directory file, contains at least one non-<slash> character, and ends with one
or more trailing <slash> characters.
EPERM or EACCES
The S_ISVTX flag is set on the directory containing the file referred to by
old and the process does not satisfy the criteria specified in the Base
Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section 4.2, Directory Protection with
respect to old; or new refers to an existing file, the S_ISVTX flag is set on
the directory containing this file, and the process does not satisfy the
criteria specified in the Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section
4.2, Directory Protection with respect to this file.
EROFS The requested operation requires writing in a directory on a read-only file
system.
EXDEV The links named by new and old are on different file systems and the
implementation does not support links between file systems.
In addition, the renameat() function shall fail if:
EACCES oldfd or newfd was not opened with O_SEARCH and the permissions of the directory
underlying oldfd or newfd respectively do not permit directory searches.
EBADF The old argument does not specify an absolute path and the oldfd argument is
neither AT_FDCWD nor a valid file descriptor open for reading or searching, or the
new argument does not specify an absolute path and the newfd argument is neither
AT_FDCWD nor a valid file descriptor open for reading or searching.
ENOTDIR
The old or new argument is not an absolute path and oldfd or newfd, respectively,
is a file descriptor associated with a non-directory file.
The rename() and renameat() functions may fail if:
EBUSY The file named by the old or new arguments is a named STREAM.
ELOOP More than {SYMLOOP_MAX} symbolic links were encountered during resolution of the
path argument.
ENAMETOOLONG
The length of a pathname exceeds {PATH_MAX}, or pathname resolution of a symbolic
link produced an intermediate result with a length that exceeds {PATH_MAX}.
ETXTBSY
The file named by new exists and is the last directory entry to a pure procedure
(shared text) file that is being executed.
The following sections are informative.
EXAMPLES
Renaming a File
The following example shows how to rename a file named /home/cnd/mod1 to /home/cnd/mod2.
#include <stdio.h>
int status;
...
status = rename("/home/cnd/mod1", "/home/cnd/mod2");
APPLICATION USAGE
Some implementations mark for update the last file status change timestamp of renamed
files and some do not. Applications which make use of the last file status change
timestamp may behave differently with respect to renamed files unless they are designed to
allow for either behavior.
RATIONALE
This rename() function is equivalent for regular files to that defined by the ISO C
standard. Its inclusion here expands that definition to include actions on directories
and specifies behavior when the new parameter names a file that already exists. That
specification requires that the action of the function be atomic.
One of the reasons for introducing this function was to have a means of renaming
directories while permitting implementations to prohibit the use of link() and unlink()
with directories, thus constraining links to directories to those made by mkdir().
The specification that if old and new refer to the same file is intended to guarantee
that:
rename("x", "x");
does not remove the file.
Renaming dot or dot-dot is prohibited in order to prevent cyclical file system paths.
See also the descriptions of [ENOTEMPTY] and [ENAMETOOLONG] in rmdir() and [EBUSY] in
unlink(). For a discussion of [EXDEV], see link().
The purpose of the renameat() function is to rename files in directories other than the
current working directory without exposure to race conditions. Any part of the path of a
file could be changed in parallel to a call to rename(), resulting in unspecified
behavior. By opening file descriptors for the source and target directories and using the
renameat() function it can be guaranteed that that renamed file is located correctly and
the resulting file is in the desired directory.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
None.
SEE ALSO
link(), rmdir(), symlink(), unlink()
The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section 4.2, Directory Protection, <stdio.h>
COPYRIGHT
Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form from IEEE Std
1003.1, 2013 Edition, Standard for Information Technology -- Portable Operating System
Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 7, Copyright (C) 2013 by the
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. (This is
POSIX.1-2008 with the 2013 Technical Corrigendum 1 applied.) In the event of any
discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard, the
original IEEE and The Open Group Standard is the referee document. The original Standard
can be obtained online at http://www.unix.org/online.html .
Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page are most likely to have
been introduced during the conversion of the source files to man page format. To report
such errors, see https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .