rename(2)
NAME
rename − change the name of a file
SYNTAX
rename(from, to)
char *from, *to;
DESCRIPTION
The rename system call causes the link named from to be renamed as to. If to exists, then it is first removed. Both from and to must be of the same type (that is, both directories or both non-directories), and must reside on the same file system.
The rename system call guarantees that an instance of to will always exist, even if the system should crash in the middle of the operation.
A 0 value is returned if the operation succeeds, otherwise rename returns −1 and the global variable errno indicates the reason for the failure.
RESTRICTIONS
The system can deadlock if a loop in the file system graph is present. This loop takes the form of an entry in directory “a”, say “a/foo”, being a hard link to directory “b”, and an entry in directory “b”, say “b/bar”, being a hard link to directory “a”. When such a loop exists and two separate processes attempt to perform “rename a/foo b/bar” and “rename b/bar a/foo”, respectively, the system may deadlock attempting to lock both directories for modification. Hard links to directories should be replaced by symbolic links by the system administrator.
DIAGNOSTICS
The rename system call will fail and neither of the argument files will be affected if any of the following are true:
[ENOTDIR] A component of either path prefix is not a directory.
[ENOENT] A component of the from path does not exist, or a path prefix of to does not exist.
[EACCES] A component of either path prefix denies search permission.
[EPERM] The to file exists, the directory containing from is marked sticky, and neither the containing directory nor the to directory is owned by the effective user ID.
[EPERM] The directory containing from is marked sticky, and neither the containing directory nor from directory is owned by the effective user ID.
[EXDEV] The link named by to and the file named by from are on different logical devices (file systems). Note that this error code will not be returned if the implementation permits cross-device links.
[EACCES] The requested link requires writing in a directory with a mode that denies write permission.
[EROFS] The requested link requires writing in a directory on a read-only file system.
[EFAULT] The path points outside the process’s allocated address space.
[EINVAL] The from is a parent directory of to, or an attempt is made to rename “.” or “..”.
[EINVAL] Either pathname contains a character with the high-order bit set.
[ENAMETOOLONG]
A component of either pathname exceeded 255 characters, or the entire length of either pathname exceeded 1023 characters.
[ELOOP] Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating either pathname.
[ENOTDIR] The from is a directory, but to is not a directory.
[EISDIR] The to is a directory, but from is not a directory.
[ENOSPC] The directory in which the entry for the new name is being placed cannot be extended because there is no space left on the file system containing the directory.
[EDQUOT] The directory in which the entry for the new name is being placed cannot be extended because the user’s quota of disk blocks on the file system containing the directory has been exhausted.
[EIO] An I/O error occurred while making or updating a directory entry.
[ENOTEMPTY]
The to is a directory and is not empty.