acct

ACCT(2)			  Linux Programmer’s Manual		      ACCT(2)



NAME
       acct - switch process accounting on or off

SYNOPSIS
       #include <unistd.h>

       int acct(const char *filename);

DESCRIPTION
       When  called with the name of an existing file as argument, accounting
       is turned on, records for each terminating  process  are	 appended  to
       filename	 as  it terminates.  An argument of NULL causes accounting to
       be turned off.

RETURN VALUE
       On success, zero is returned.  On error, -1 is returned, and errno  is
       set appropriately.

ERRORS
       EACCES Write permission is denied for the specified file.

       EACCES The argument filename is not a regular file.

       EFAULT filename points outside your accessible address space.

       EIO    Error writing to the file filename.

       EISDIR filename is a directory.

       ELOOP  Too many symbolic links were encountered in resolving filename.

       ENAMETOOLONG
	      filename was too long.

       ENOENT The specified filename does not exist.

       ENOMEM Out of memory.

       ENOSYS BSD process accounting has not been enabled when the  operating
	      system kernel was compiled.  The kernel configuration parameter
	      controlling this feature is CONFIG_BSD_PROCESS_ACCT.

       ENOTDIR
	      A component used as a directory in filename is not  in  fact  a
	      directory.

       EPERM  The  calling  process  has  no  permission  to  enable  process
	      accounting.

       EROFS  filename refers to a file on a read-only file system.

       EUSERS There are no more free file structures or we ran out of memory.

CONFORMING TO
       SVr4 (but not POSIX).  SVr4 documents an EBUSY error condition, but no
       EISDIR or ENOSYS. Also AIX and HPUX document EBUSY (attempt is made to
       enable  accounting  when	 it  is	 already  enabled),  as	 does Solaris
       (attempt is made to enable accounting using the same file that is cur-
       rently being used).

NOTES
       No  accounting  is  produced for programs running when a crash occurs.
       In particular, nonterminating processes are never accounted for.





Linux 2.1.126			  1998-11-04			      ACCT(2)