1.\" Copyright (c) 1980, 1991, 1993 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 6.\" are met: 7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 11.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 12.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 13.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 14.\" without specific prior written permission. 15.\" 16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 17.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 18.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 19.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 20.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 21.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 22.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 23.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 24.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 25.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 26.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 27.\" 28.\" @(#)lseek.2 8.3 (Berkeley) 4/19/94 29.\" $FreeBSD: src/lib/libc/sys/lseek.2,v 1.10.2.6 2001/12/14 18:34:01 ru Exp $ 30.\" $DragonFly: src/lib/libc/sys/lseek.2,v 1.3 2006/02/17 19:35:06 swildner Exp $ 31.\" 32.Dd April 19, 1994 33.Dt LSEEK 2 34.Os 35.Sh NAME 36.Nm lseek 37.Nd reposition read/write file offset 38.Sh LIBRARY 39.Lb libc 40.Sh SYNOPSIS 41.In unistd.h 42.Ft off_t 43.Fn lseek "int fildes" "off_t offset" "int whence" 44.Sh DESCRIPTION 45The 46.Fn lseek 47function repositions the offset of the file descriptor 48.Fa fildes 49to the 50argument 51.Fa offset 52according to the directive 53.Fa whence . 54The argument 55.Fa fildes 56must be an open 57file descriptor. 58.Fn Lseek 59repositions the file position pointer associated with the file 60descriptor 61.Fa fildes 62as follows: 63.Bl -item -offset indent 64.It 65If 66.Fa whence 67is 68.Dv SEEK_SET , 69the offset is set to 70.Fa offset 71bytes. 72.It 73If 74.Fa whence 75is 76.Dv SEEK_CUR , 77the offset is set to its current location plus 78.Fa offset 79bytes. 80.It 81If 82.Fa whence 83is 84.Dv SEEK_END , 85the offset is set to the size of the 86file plus 87.Fa offset 88bytes. 89.El 90.Pp 91The 92.Fn lseek 93function allows the file offset to be set beyond the end 94of the existing end-of-file of the file. 95If data is later written 96at this point, subsequent reads of the data in the gap return 97bytes of zeros (until data is actually written into the gap). 98.Pp 99Some devices are incapable of seeking. The value of the pointer 100associated with such a device is undefined. 101.Sh RETURN VALUES 102Upon successful completion, 103.Fn lseek 104returns the resulting offset location as measured in bytes from the 105beginning of the file. 106Otherwise, 107a value of -1 is returned and 108.Va errno 109is set to indicate 110the error. 111.Sh ERRORS 112.Fn Lseek 113will fail and the file position pointer will remain unchanged if: 114.Bl -tag -width Er 115.It Bq Er EBADF 116.Em Fildes 117is not an open file descriptor. 118.It Bq Er ESPIPE 119.Em Fildes 120is associated with a pipe, socket, or FIFO. 121.It Bq Er EINVAL 122.Fa Whence 123is not a proper value. 124.El 125.Sh SEE ALSO 126.Xr dup 2 , 127.Xr open 2 128.Sh STANDARDS 129The 130.Fn lseek 131function call is expected to conform to 132.St -p1003.1-90 . 133.Sh HISTORY 134A 135.Fn lseek 136function call appeared in 137.At v7 . 138.Sh BUGS 139This document's use of 140.Fa whence 141is incorrect English, but is maintained for historical reasons. 142