Man Tmpnam en anglais
TMPNAM(3)                  Linux Programmer's Manual                 TMPNAM(3)



 

NAME


       tmpnam, tmpnam_r - create a name for a temporary file

 

SYNOPSIS


       #include 

       char *tmpnam(char *s);

 

DESCRIPTION






       The  tmpnam()  function  returns  a pointer to a string that is a valid
       filename, and such that a file with this name did  not  exist  at  some
       point  in  time, so that naive programmers may think it a suitable name
       for a temporary file.  If the argument s is NULL this name is generated
       in an internal static buffer and may be overwritten by the next call to
       tmpnam().  If s is not NULL, the name is copied to the character  array
       (of  length  at  least  L_tmpnam)  pointed  to  by s and the value s is
       returned in case of success.

       The pathname that is created, has a directory prefix  P_tmpdir.   (Both
       L_tmpnam  and  P_tmpdir are defined in , just like the TMP_MAX
       mentioned below.)

 

RETURN VALUE


       The tmpnam() function returns a pointer to a unique temporary filename,
       or NULL if a unique name cannot be generated.

 

ERRORS


       No errors are defined.

 

CONFORMING TO


       SVr4, 4.3BSD, C89, C99, POSIX.1-2001.

 

NOTES


       The  tmpnam()  function  generates  a  different string each time it is
       called, up to TMP_MAX times.  If it is called more than TMP_MAX  times,
       the behavior is implementation defined.

       Although  tmpnam()  generates  names that are difficult to guess, it is
       nevertheless possible that between the time  that  tmpnam()  returns  a
       pathname, and the time that the program opens it, another program might
       create that pathname using open(2), or create it as  a  symbolic  link.
       This  can lead to security holes.  To avoid such possibilities, use the
       open(2)  O_EXCL  flag  to  open  the  pathname.   Or  better  yet,  use
       mkstemp(3) or tmpfile(3).

       Portable applications that use threads cannot call tmpnam() with a NULL
       argument if either _POSIX_THREADS  or  _POSIX_THREAD_SAFE_FUNCTIONS  is
       defined.

       A POSIX draft proposed to use a function tmpnam_r() defined by

           char *
           tmpnam_r(char *s)
           {
               return s ? tmpnam(s) : NULL;
           }

       apparently  as  a warning not to use NULL.  A few systems implement it.
       To get a glibc prototype for  this  function,  define  _SVID_SOURCE  or
       _BSD_SOURCE before including .

 

BUGS


       Never use this function.  Use mkstemp(3) or tmpfile(3) instead.

 

SEE ALSO


       mkstemp(3), mktemp(3), tempnam(3), tmpfile(3)

 

COLOPHON


       This  page  is  part of release 3.05 of the Linux man-pages project.  A
       description of the project, and information about reporting  bugs,  can
       be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.



                                  2003-11-15                         TMPNAM(3)