15.2.1 Cross-Unix Function Calls

Functions not mentioned in POSIX.1 may not be available on all systems. If you want to use one of these functions, you should normally check for its presence by using `AC_CHECK_FUNCS' in your `configure.in' script, and adapt to its absence if possible. Here is a list of some popular functions which are available on many, but not all, modern Unix systems:

alloca

There are several portability issues with alloca. See the description of AC_FUNC_ALLOCA in the autoconf manual. Although this function can be very convenient, it is normally best to avoid it in highly portable code.

dlopen

GNU libtool provides a portable alternate interface to dlopen. See section 17. Dynamic Loading.

getline

In some cases fgets may be used as a fallback. In others, you will need to provide your own version of this function.

getpagesize

On some systems, the page size is available as the macro PAGE_SIZE in the header file `sys/param.h'. On others, the page size is available via the sysconf function. If none of those work, you must generally simply guess a value such as 4096.

gettimeofday

When this is not available, fall back to a less precise function such as time or ftime (which itself is not available on all systems).

mmap

In some cases you can use either mmap or ordinary file I/O. In others, a program which uses mmap will simply not be portable to all Unix systems. Note that mmap is an optional part of the 1996 version of POSIX.1, so it is likely to be added to all Unix systems over time.

ptrace

Unix systems without ptrace generally provide some other mechanism for debugging subprocesses, such as `/proc'. However, there is no widely portable method for controlling subprocesses, as evidenced by the source code to the GNU debugger, gdb.

setuid

Different Unix systems handle this differently. On some systems, any program can switch between the effective user ID of the executable and the real user ID. On others, switching to the real user ID is final; some of those systems provide the setreuid function instead to switch the effective and real user ID. The effect when a program run by the superuser calls setuid varies among systems.

snprintf

If this is not available, then in some cases it will be reasonable to simply use sprintf, and in others you will need to write a little routine to estimate the required length and allocate an appropriate buffer before calling sprintf.

strcasecmp

strdup

strncasecmp

You can normally provide your own version of these simple functions.

valloc

When this is not available, just use malloc instead.

vfork

When this is not available, just use fork instead.