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SENDFILE(2)                 BSD System Calls Manual                SENDFILE(2)

NAME
     sendfile -- send a file to a socket

SYNOPSIS
     #include <sys/types.h>
     #include <sys/socket.h>
     #include <sys/uio.h>

     int
     sendfile(int fd, int s, off_t offset, off_t *len, struct sf_hdtr *hdtr, int flags);

DESCRIPTION
     The sendfile() system call sends a regular file specified by descriptor fd out a stream socket speci-fied specified
     fied by descriptor s.

     The offset argument specifies where to begin in the file.  Should offset fall beyond the end of file,
     the system will return success and report 0 bytes sent as described below.

     The len argument is a value-result parameter, that specifies how many bytes of the file should be sent
     and/or how many bytes have been sent.  Initially the value pointed to by the len argument specifies how
     many bytes should be sent with 0 having the special meaning to send until the end of file has been
     reached.  On return the value pointed to by the len argument indicates how many bytes have been sent.
     The len pointer may not be NULL.

     An optional header and/or trailer can be sent before and after the file data by specifying a pointer to
     a struct sf_hdtr, which has the following structure:

           struct sf_hdtr {
                   struct iovec *headers;  /* pointer to header iovecs */
                   int hdr_cnt;            /* number of header iovecs */
                   struct iovec *trailers; /* pointer to trailer iovecs */
                   int trl_cnt;            /* number of trailer iovecs */
           };

     The headers and trailers pointers, if non-NULL, point to arrays of struct iovec structures.  See the
     writev() system call for information on the iovec structure.  The number of iovecs in these arrays is
     specified by hdr_cnt and trl_cnt.

     The flags parameter is reserved for future expansion and must be set to 0. Any other value will cause
     sendfile() to return EINVAL.

     When using a socket marked for non-blocking I/O, sendfile() may send fewer bytes than requested.  In
     this case, the number of bytes successfully sent is returned in the via the len parameters and the
     error EAGAIN is returned.

     When a signal causes sendfile() to return the error EINTR, the len argument may return 0 without neces-sarily necessarily
     sarily meaning the end of file has been reached as the signal may have been caught before any data was
     sent.

IMPLEMENTATION NOTES
     The Mac OS X implementation of sendfile() uses 64 bits types for size and offset parameters so there is
     no need for a 64 bits version sendfile64() as found on some other operating systems.

RETURN VALUES
     The sendfile() function returns the value 0 if successful; otherwise the value -1 is returned and the
     global variable errno is set to indicate the error.

     The number of bytes sent is returned via the parameter len.  A value of 0 means the end of the file
     specified by descriptor fd has been reached or that the value passed in offset falls beyond the end of
     file.

ERRORS
     [EAGAIN]           The socket is marked for non-blocking I/O and not all data was sent due to the
                        socket buffer being full.  If specified, the number of bytes successfully sent will
                        be returned in *len.

     [EBADF]            The fd argument is not a valid file descriptor.

     [ENOTSUP]          The fd argument does not refer to a regular file.

     [EBADF]            The s argument is not a valid socket descriptor.

     [ENOTSOCK]         The s argument does not refer stream oriented socket.

     [EFAULT]           An invalid address was specified for an argument.

     [EINTR]            A signal interrupted sendfile() before it could be completed.  If specified, the
                        number of bytes successfully sent will be returned in *len.

     [EINVAL]           The offset argument is negative.

     [EINVAL]           The len argument is NULL.

     [EINVAL]           The flags argument is not set to 0.

     [EIO]              An error occurred while reading from fd.

     [ENOTCONN]         The s argument points to an unconnected socket.

     [ENOTSOCK]         The s argument is not a socket.

     [EOPNOTSUPP]       The file system for descriptor fd does not support sendfile().

     [EPIPE]            The socket peer has closed the connection.

SEE ALSO
     open(2), send(2), socket(2), writev(2)

HISTORY
     The sendfile() system call first appeared in Darwin 9.0 (Mac OS X version 10.5) .

AUTHORS
     This manual page is based on the FreeBSD version written by David G. Lawrence <dg@dglawrence.com>

Mac OS X                        March 31, 2006                        Mac OS X