acct(2)                                                             acct(2)




 NAME    [Toc]    [Back]
      acct() - enable or disable process accounting

 SYNOPSIS    [Toc]    [Back]
      #include <sys/acct.h>

      int acct(const char *path);

 DESCRIPTION    [Toc]    [Back]
      The acct() system call enables or disables the system's process
      accounting routine.  If the routine is enabled, an accounting record
      is written on an accounting file for each process that terminates.
      Termination can be caused by one of two things: an exit() call or a
      signal (see exit(2) and signal(5)).  The effective user ID of the
      calling process must be superuser to use this call.

      path points to a path name naming the accounting file.  The accounting
      file format is described in acct(4).

      The accounting routine is enabled if path is nonzero and no errors
      occur during the system call.  It is disabled if path is zero and no
      errors occur during the system call.

      When the amount of free space on the file system containing the
      accounting file falls below a configurable threshold, the system
      prints a message on the console and disables process accounting.
      Another message is printed and the process accounting is re-enabled
      when the space reaches a second configurable threshold.

      If the size of the process accounting file reaches a configurable
      limit, records for processes terminating after that point will be
      silently lost.  However, in that case the turnacct command would still
      sense that process accounting is still enabled.  This loss of records
      can be prevented with the ckpacct command.  ckpacct and turnacct are
      described in acctsh(1M)).

 RETURN VALUE    [Toc]    [Back]
      acct() returns the following values:

            0   Successful completion.
           -1   Failure.  errno is set to indicate the error.

 ERRORS    [Toc]    [Back]
      If acct() fails, errno is set to one of the following values.

           [EACCES]       The file named by path is not an ordinary file.

           [EBUSY]        An attempt is being made to enable accounting when
                          it is already enabled.





 Hewlett-Packard Company            - 1 -   HP-UX 11i Version 2: August 2003






 acct(2)                                                             acct(2)




           [EFAULT]       path points to an illegal address.  The reliable
                          detection of this error is implementation
                          dependent.

           [ELOOP]        Too many symbolic links were encountered in
                          translating the path name.

           [ENAMETOOLONG] The accounting file path name exceeds PATH_MAX
                          bytes, or the length of a component of the path
                          name exceeds NAME_MAX bytes while _POSIX_NO_TRUNC
                          is in effect.

           [ENOENT]       One or more components of the accounting file path
                          name do not exist.

           [ENOTDIR]      A component of the path prefix is not a directory.

           [EPERM]        The effective user ID of the calling process is
                          not superuser.

           [EROFS]        The named file resides on a read-only file system.

           [ETXTBSY]      path points to a text file which is currently
                          open.

 SEE ALSO    [Toc]    [Back]
      acct(1M), acctsh(1M), exit(2), acct(4), signal(5).

 STANDARDS CONFORMANCE    [Toc]    [Back]
      acct(): SVID2, SVID3, XPG2


 Hewlett-Packard Company            - 2 -   HP-UX 11i Version 2: August 2003