unix/linux - poll

1, poll function

2, man manual of poll

1, poll function
The poll function is similar to select, but the programmer interface is different. This
function was originally introduced in System V to support the STREAMS subsystem,
but we are able to use it with any type of file descriptor.

#include <poll.h>
int poll(struct pollfd fdarray[], nfds_t nfds, int timeout);
                            Returns: count of ready descriptors, 0 on timeout, −1 on error

With poll, instead of building a set of descriptors for each condition (readability,
writability, and exception condition) as we did with select, we build an array of
pollfd structures, with each array element specifying a descriptor number and the
conditions that we’re interested in for that descriptor:

struct pollfd {
	int fd; /* file descriptor to check, or <0 to ignore */
	short events; /* events of interest on fd */
	short revents; /* events that occurred on fd */
};

The number of elements in the fdarray array is specified by nfds.

Historically, there have been differences in how the nfds parameter was declared. SVR3
specified the number of elements in the array as an unsigned long, which seems excessive.
In the SVR4 manual [AT&T 1990d], the prototype for poll showed the data type of the second
argument as size_t. (Recall the primitive system data types from Figure 2.21.) But the actual
prototype in the <poll.h> header still showed the second argument as an unsigned long.
The Single UNIX Specification defines the new type nfds_t to allow the implementation to
select the appropriate type and hide the details from applications. Note that this type has to be
large enough to hold an integer, since the return value represents the number of entries in the
array with satisfied events.
The SVID corresponding to SVR4 [AT&T 1989] showed the first argument to poll as struct
pollfd fdarray[], whereas the SVR4 manual page [AT&T 1990d] showed this argument as
struct pollfd *fdarray. In the C language, both declarations are equivalent. We use the
first declaration to reiterate that fdarray points to an array of structures and not a pointer to
a single structure.

To tell the kernel which events we’re interested in for each descriptor, we have to set
the events member of each array element to one or more of the values in Figure 14.17.
On return, the revents member is set by the kernel, thereby specifying which events
have occurred for each descriptor. (Note that poll doesn’t change the events
member. This behavior differs from that of select, which modifies its arguments to
indicate what is ready.)

The first four rows of Figure test for readability, the next three test for
writability, and the final three are for exception conditions. The last three rows in
Figure are set by the kernel on return. These three values are returned in
revents when the condition occurs, even if they weren’t specified in the events field.
The poll event names containing the term BAND refer to priority bands in STREAMS. Refer to
Rago [1993] for more information about STREAMS and priority bands.
When a descriptor is hung up (POLLHUP), we can no longer write to the descriptor.
There may, however, still be data to be read from the descriptor.
The final argument to poll specifies how long we want to wait. As with select,
there are three cases.
timeout == −1

Wait forever. (Some systems define the constant INFTIM in <stropts.h> as
−1.) We return when one of the specified descriptors is ready or when a signal
is caught. If a signal is caught, poll returns −1 with errno set to EINTR.

timeout == 0

Don’t wait. All the specified descriptors are tested, and we return immediately.
This is a way to poll the system to find out the status of multiple descriptors,
without blocking in the call to poll.

timeout > 0

Wait timeout milliseconds. We return when one of the specified descriptors is
ready or when the timeout expires. If the timeout expires before any of the
descriptors is ready, the return value is 0. (If your system doesn’t provide
millisecond resolution, timeout is rounded up to the nearest supported value.)

It is important to realize the difference between an end of file and a hangup. If we’re entering data from the terminal and type the end-of-file character, POLLIN is turned on so we can read the end-of-file indication (read returns 0). POLLHUP is not turned on in revents. If we’re reading from a modem and the telephone line is hung up, we’ll receive the POLLHUP notification.
As with select, whether a descriptor is blocking doesn’t affect whether poll blocks.

Interruptibility of select and poll

When the automatic restarting of interrupted system calls was introduced with 4.2BSD
(Section 10.5), the select function was never restarted. This characteristic continues
with most systems even if the SA_RESTART option is specified. But under SVR4, if
SA_RESTART was specified, even select and poll were automatically restarted. To
prevent this from catching us when we port software to systems derived from SVR4,
we’ll always use the signal_intr function (Figure 10.19) if the signal could interrupt
a call to select or poll.

2, man manual of poll
Linux Programmer’s Manual about poll can be get through man poll, The below context is the the manual of poll.

POLL(2) Linux Programmer’s Manual POLL(2)

NAME
poll, ppoll - wait for some event on a file descriptor

SYNOPSIS
       #include <poll.h>

       int poll(struct pollfd *fds, nfds_t nfds, int timeout);

       #define _GNU_SOURCE         /* See feature_test_macros(7) */
       #include <signal.h>
       #include <poll.h>

       int ppoll(struct pollfd *fds, nfds_t nfds,
               const struct timespec *tmo_p, const sigset_t *sigmask);

DESCRIPTION
poll() performs a similar task to select(2): it waits for one of a set of file descriptors to become ready to perform I/O.

   The set of file descriptors to be monitored is specified in the fds argument, which is an array of structures of the following form:

           struct pollfd {
               int   fd;         /* file descriptor */
               short events;     /* requested events */
               short revents;    /* returned events */
           };

   The caller should specify the number of items in the fds array in nfds.

   The  field  fd  contains  a file descriptor for an open file.  If this field is negative, then the corresponding events field is ignored and the revents field returns
   zero.  (This provides an easy way of ignoring a file descriptor for a single poll() call: simply negate the fd field.  Note, however, that  this  technique  can't  be
   used to ignore file descriptor 0.)

   The  field events is an input parameter, a bit mask specifying the events the application is interested in for the file descriptor fd.  This field may be specified as
   zero, in which case the only events that can be returned in revents are POLLHUP, POLLERR, and POLLNVAL (see below).

   The field revents is an output parameter, filled by the kernel with the events that actually occurred.  The bits returned in revents can include any of  those  speci‐
   fied in events, or one of the values POLLERR, POLLHUP, or POLLNVAL.  (These three bits are meaningless in the events field, and will be set in the revents field when‐
   ever the corresponding condition is true.)

   If none of the events requested (and no error) has occurred for any of the file descriptors, then poll() blocks until one of the events occurs.

   The timeout argument specifies the number of milliseconds that poll() should block waiting for a file descriptor to become ready.  The call will block until either:

   *  a file descriptor becomes ready;

   *  the call is interrupted by a signal handler; or

   *  the timeout expires.

   Note that the timeout interval will be rounded up to the system clock granularity, and kernel scheduling delays mean that the blocking interval may overrun by a small
   amount.  Specifying a negative value in timeout means an infinite timeout.  Specifying a timeout of zero causes poll() to return immediately, even if no file descrip‐
   tors are ready.

   The bits that may be set/returned in events and revents are defined in <poll.h>:

   POLLIN There is data to read.

   POLLPRI
          There is some exceptional condition on the file descriptor.  Possibilities include:

          *  There is out-of-band data on a TCP socket (see tcp(7)).

          *  A pseudoterminal master in packet mode has seen a state change on the slave (see ioctl_tty(2)).

          *  A cgroup.events file has been modified (see cgroups(7)).

   POLLOUT
          Writing is now possible, though a write larger that the available space in a socket or pipe will still block (unless O_NONBLOCK is set).

   POLLRDHUP (since Linux 2.6.17)
          Stream socket peer closed connection, or shut down writing half of connection.  The _GNU_SOURCE feature test macro must be defined (before including any header
          files) in order to obtain this definition.

   POLLERR
          Error  condition  (only returned in revents; ignored in events).  This bit is also set for a file descriptor referring to the write end of a pipe when the read
          end has been closed.

   POLLHUP
          Hang up (only returned in revents; ignored in events).  Note that when reading from a channel such as a pipe or a stream socket, this  event  merely  indicates
          that  the peer closed its end of the channel.  Subsequent reads from the channel will return 0 (end of file) only after all outstanding data in the channel has
          been consumed.

   POLLNVAL
          Invalid request: fd not open (only returned in revents; ignored in events).

   When compiling with _XOPEN_SOURCE defined, one also has the following, which convey no further information beyond the bits listed above:

   POLLRDNORM
          Equivalent to POLLIN.

   POLLRDBAND
          Priority band data can be read (generally unused on Linux).

   POLLWRNORM
          Equivalent to POLLOUT.

   POLLWRBAND
          Priority data may be written.

   Linux also knows about, but does not use POLLMSG.

ppoll()
The relationship between poll() and ppoll() is analogous to the relationship between select(2) and pselect(2): like pselect(2), ppoll() allows an application to
safely wait until either a file descriptor becomes ready or until a signal is caught.

   Other than the difference in the precision of the timeout argument, the following ppoll() call:

       ready = ppoll(&fds, nfds, tmo_p, &sigmask);

   is equivalent to atomically executing the following calls:

       sigset_t origmask;
       int timeout;

       timeout = (tmo_p == NULL) ? -1 :
                 (tmo_p->tv_sec * 1000 + tmo_p->tv_nsec / 1000000);
       pthread_sigmask(SIG_SETMASK, &sigmask, &origmask);
       ready = poll(&fds, nfds, timeout);
       pthread_sigmask(SIG_SETMASK, &origmask, NULL);

   See the description of pselect(2) for an explanation of why ppoll() is necessary.

   If the sigmask argument is specified as NULL, then no signal mask manipulation is performed (and thus ppoll() differs from poll() only in the precision of the timeout
   argument).

   The tmo_p argument specifies an upper limit on the amount of time that ppoll() will block.  This argument is a pointer to a structure of the following form:

       struct timespec {
           long    tv_sec;         /* seconds */
           long    tv_nsec;        /* nanoseconds */
       };

   If tmo_p is specified as NULL, then ppoll() can block indefinitely.

RETURN VALUE
On success, a positive number is returned; this is the number of structures which have nonzero revents fields (in other words, those descriptors with events or errors
reported). A value of 0 indicates that the call timed out and no file descriptors were ready. On error, -1 is returned, and errno is set appropriately.

ERRORS
EFAULT The array given as argument was not contained in the calling program’s address space.

   EINTR  A signal occurred before any requested event; see signal(7).

   EINVAL The nfds value exceeds the RLIMIT_NOFILE value.

   ENOMEM There was no space to allocate file descriptor tables.

VERSIONS
The poll() system call was introduced in Linux 2.1.23. On older kernels that lack this system call, the glibc (and the old Linux libc) poll() wrapper function pro‐
vides emulation using select(2).

   The ppoll() system call was added to Linux in kernel 2.6.16.  The ppoll() library call was added in glibc 2.4.

CONFORMING TO
poll() conforms to POSIX.1-2001 and POSIX.1-2008. ppoll() is Linux-specific.

NOTES
On some other UNIX systems, poll() can fail with the error EAGAIN if the system fails to allocate kernel-internal resources, rather than ENOMEM as Linux does. POSIX
permits this behavior. Portable programs may wish to check for EAGAIN and loop, just as with EINTR.

   Some implementations define the nonstandard constant INFTIM with the value -1 for use as a timeout for poll().  This constant is not provided in glibc.

   For a discussion of what may happen if a file descriptor being monitored by poll() is closed in another thread, see select(2).

C library/kernel differences
The Linux ppoll() system call modifies its tmo_p argument. However, the glibc wrapper function hides this behavior by using a local variable for the timeout argument
that is passed to the system call. Thus, the glibc ppoll() function does not modify its tmo_p argument.

   The raw ppoll() system call has a fifth argument, size_t sigsetsize, which specifies the size in bytes of the sigmask argument.  The glibc  ppoll()  wrapper  function
   specifies  this  argument as a fixed value (equal to sizeof(kernel_sigset_t)).  See sigprocmask(2) for a discussion on the differences between the kernel and the libc
   notion of the sigset.

BUGS
See the discussion of spurious readiness notifications under the BUGS section of select(2).

SEE ALSO
restart_syscall(2), select(2), select_tut(2), epoll(7), time(7)

COLOPHON
This page is part of release 4.15 of the Linux man-pages project. A description of the project, information about reporting bugs, and the latest version of this
page, can be found at https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.

Linux 2017-09-15 POLL(2)