FreeBSD man pages : readlink (2)
READLINK(2) FreeBSD System Calls Manual READLINK(2)
readlink - read value of a symbolic link
Standard C Library (libc, -lc)
readlink(const char *path, char *buf, int bufsiz);
Readlink() places the contents of the symbolic link path in the buffer
buf, which has size bufsiz. The readlink() function does not append a
NUL character to buf.
The call returns the count of characters placed in the buffer if it suc-
ceeds, or a -1 if an error occurs, placing the error code in the global
Readlink() will fail if:
[ENOTDIR] A component of the path prefix is not a directory.
[ENAMETOOLONG] A component of a pathname exceeded 255 characters, or
an entire path name exceeded 1023 characters.
[ENOENT] The named file does not exist.
[EACCES] Search permission is denied for a component of the
[ELOOP] Too many symbolic links were encountered in translat-
ing the pathname.
[EINVAL] The named file is not a symbolic link.
[EIO] An I/O error occurred while reading from the file sys-
[EFAULT] Buf extends outside the process's allocated address
lstat(2), stat(2), symlink(2), symlink(7)
The readlink() function call appeared in 4.2BSD.
FreeBSD 4.8 June 4, 1993 FreeBSD 4.8