UPANIC(2) System Calls UPANIC(2)

upanic — user process panic

#include <upanic.h>

void noreturn
upanic(const char *msg, size_t len);

The () system call terminates the calling process and generates a core file in the process, subject to the current core file settings as described in core(5) and controlled by coreadm(8).

Unlike abort(3C), signals are not generated, which avoids two related challenges:

  1. A signal handler attempting to catch a SIGABRT.
  2. Needing to make multiple system calls and potentially unmasking the signal.

The () system call allows an optional message to be transmitted that will be put in a NT_UPANIC elf note in the resulting core file. If a message is not desired, then one should pass NULL for msg. In general, it is expected that msg is a character string with a human-readable message; however, it may include binary data. The system will copy len bytes regardless of whether the string has a NUL character to terminate it or not. If msg points to an invalid value or len is a size that is larger than the system's internal maximum size, then the process will still terminate; however, this will be noted in the NT_UPANIC elf note.

The () system call is illumos-specific and not portable to other systems. For portable applications, instead use abort(3C).

The upanic() system call does not return. It always terminates the process.

elfdump(1), mdb(1), upanic.h(3HEAD), core(5), coreadm(8)

October 31, 2020 OmniOS