pause(3p) — Linux manual page
PAUSE(3P) POSIX Programmer's Manual PAUSE(3P)
PROLOG
This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual. The
Linux implementation of this interface may differ (consult the
corresponding Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior),
or the interface may not be implemented on Linux.
NAME
pause — suspend the thread until a signal is received
SYNOPSIS
#include <unistd.h>
int pause(void);
DESCRIPTION
The pause() function shall suspend the calling thread until
delivery of a signal whose action is either to execute a signal-
catching function or to terminate the process.
If the action is to terminate the process, pause() shall not
return.
If the action is to execute a signal-catching function, pause()
shall return after the signal-catching function returns.
RETURN VALUE
Since pause() suspends thread execution indefinitely unless
interrupted by a signal, there is no successful completion return
value. A value of -1 shall be returned and errno set to indicate
the error.
ERRORS
The pause() function shall fail if:
EINTR A signal is caught by the calling process and control is
returned from the signal-catching function.
The following sections are informative.
EXAMPLES
None.
APPLICATION USAGE
Many common uses of pause() have timing windows. The scenario
involves checking a condition related to a signal and, if the
signal has not occurred, calling pause(). When the signal occurs
between the check and the call to pause(), the process often
blocks indefinitely. The sigprocmask() and sigsuspend() functions
can be used to avoid this type of problem.
RATIONALE
None.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
None.
SEE ALSO
sigsuspend(3p)
The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, unistd.h(0p)
COPYRIGHT
Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic
form from IEEE Std 1003.1-2017, Standard for Information
Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The
Open Group Base Specifications Issue 7, 2018 Edition, Copyright
(C) 2018 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics
Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the event of any
discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and The
Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group
Standard is the referee document. The original Standard can be
obtained online at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .
Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page
are most likely to have been introduced during the conversion of
the source files to man page format. To report such errors, see
https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .
IEEE/The Open Group 2017 PAUSE(3P)
Pages that refer to this page: unistd.h(0p), alarm(3p), sighold(3p), signal(3p), sigsuspend(3p), sigtimedwait(3p), sigwait(3p), sleep(3p)