GETXATTR(2)                 BSD System Calls Manual                GETXATTR(2)

NAME
     getxattr, fgetxattr -- get an extended attribute value

SYNOPSIS
     #include <sys/xattr.h>

     ssize_t
     getxattr(const char *path, const char *name, void *value, size_t size,
         u_int32_t position, int options);

     ssize_t
     fgetxattr(int fd, const char *name, void *value, size_t size,
         u_int32_t position, int options);

DESCRIPTION
     Extended attributes extend the basic attributes of files and directories
     in the file system.  They are stored as name:data pairs associated with
     file system objects (files, directories, symlinks, etc).

     The getxattr() function retrieves up to size bytes of data from the
     extended attribute identified by name associated with path into the pre-
     allocated buffer pointed to by value.  The function returns the number of
     bytes of data retrieved.

     An extended attribute's name is a simple NULL-terminated UTF-8 string.
     position specifies an offset within the extended attribute.  In the cur-
     rent implementation, this argument is only used with the resource fork
     attribute.  For all other extended attributes, this parameter is reserved
     and should be zero.

     On success, value contains the data associated with name.  When value is
     set to NULL, getxattr() returns current size of the named attribute.
     This facility can be used to determine the size of a buffer sufficiently
     large to hold the data currently associated with the attribute.

     options specify options for retrieving extended attributes:

     XATTR_NOFOLLOW  do not follow symbolic links.  getxattr() normally
                     returns information from the target of path if it is a
                     symbolic link.  With this option, getxattr() will return
                     extended attribute data from the symbolic link instead.

     XATTR_SHOWCOMPRESSION
                     getxattr() and fgetxattr() will return HFS Plus Compres-
                     sion extended attribute name (if present) for the file
                     referred to by path or fd.

     fgetxattr() is identical to getxattr(), except that it retrieves extended
     attribute data from the open file referenced by the file descriptor fd.

RETURN VALUES
     On success, the size of the extended attribute data is returned.  On
     failure, -1 is returned and the global variable errno is set as follows.

ERRORS
     [ENOATTR]          The extended attribute does not exist.

     [ENOTSUP]          The file system does not support extended attributes
                        or has the feature disabled.

     [ERANGE]           value (as indicated by size) is too small to hold the
                        extended attribute data.

     [EPERM]            The named attribute is not permitted for this type of
                        object.

     [EINVAL]           name is invalid or options has an unsupported bit set.

     [EISDIR]           path or fd do not refer to a regular file and the
                        attribute in question is only applicable to files.
                        Similar to EPERM.

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

     [ENAMETOOLONG]     The length of name exceeds XATTR_MAXNAMELEN UTF-8
                        bytes, or a component of path exceeds NAME_MAX charac-
                        ters, or the entire path exceeds PATH_MAX characters.

     [EACCES]           Search permission is denied for a component of path or
                        the attribute is not allowed to be read (e.g. an ACL
                        prohibits reading the attributes of this file).

     [ELOOP]            Too many symbolic links were encountered in translat-
                        ing the pathname.

     [EFAULT]           path or name points to an invalid address.

     [EIO]              An I/O error occurred while reading from or writing to
                        the file system.

SEE ALSO
     listxattr(2), removexattr(2), setxattr(2)

HISTORY
     getxattr() and fgetxattr() first appeared in Mac OS X 10.4.

Mac OS X                         Oct 19, 2004                         Mac OS X