acct(2) - Linux manual page (original) (raw)

acct(2) System Calls Manual acct(2)

NAME top

   acct - switch process accounting on or off

LIBRARY top

   Standard C library (_libc_, _-lc_)

SYNOPSIS top

   **#include <unistd.h>**

   **int acct(const char *_Nullable** _filename_**);**

Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see feature_test_macros(7)):

   **acct**():
       Since glibc 2.21:
           _DEFAULT_SOURCE
       In glibc 2.19 and 2.20:
           _DEFAULT_SOURCE || (_XOPEN_SOURCE && _XOPEN_SOURCE < 500)
       Up to and including glibc 2.19:
           _BSD_SOURCE || (_XOPEN_SOURCE && _XOPEN_SOURCE < 500)

DESCRIPTION top

   The **acct**() system call enables or disables process accounting.  If
   called with the name of an existing file as its argument,
   accounting is turned on, and records for each terminating process
   are appended to _filename_ as it terminates.  An argument of NULL
   causes accounting to be turned off.

RETURN VALUE top

   On success, zero is returned.  On error, -1 is returned, and _[errno](../man3/errno.3.html)_
   is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS top

   **EACCES** Write permission is denied for the specified file, or
          search permission is denied for one of the directories in
          the path prefix of _filename_ (see also [path_resolution(7)](../man7/path%5Fresolution.7.html)),
          or _filename_ is not a regular file.

   **EFAULT** _filename_ points outside your accessible address space.

   **EIO** Error writing to the file _filename_.

   **EISDIR** _filename_ is a directory.

   **ELOOP** Too many symbolic links were encountered in resolving
          _filename_.

   **ENAMETOOLONG**
          _filename_ was too long.

   **ENFILE** The system-wide limit on the total number of open files has
          been reached.

   **ENOENT** The specified file does not exist.

   **ENOMEM** Out of memory.

   **ENOSYS** BSD process accounting has not been enabled when the
          operating system kernel was compiled.  The kernel
          configuration parameter controlling this feature is
          **CONFIG_BSD_PROCESS_ACCT**.

   **ENOTDIR**
          A component used as a directory in _filename_ is not in fact
          a directory.

   **EPERM** The calling process has insufficient privilege to enable
          process accounting.  On Linux, the **CAP_SYS_PACCT** capability
          is required.

   **EROFS** _filename_ refers to a file on a read-only filesystem.

   **EUSERS** There are no more free file structures or we ran out of
          memory.

STANDARDS top

   None.

HISTORY top

   SVr4, 4.3BSD.

NOTES top

   No accounting is produced for programs running when a system crash
   occurs.  In particular, nonterminating processes are never
   accounted for.

   The structure of the records written to the accounting file is
   described in [acct(5)](../man5/acct.5.html).

SEE ALSO top

   [acct(5)](../man5/acct.5.html)

COLOPHON top

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Linux man-pages 6.10 2024-07-23 acct(2)

Pages that refer to this page:syscalls(2), acct(5), capabilities(7), feature_test_macros(7)