ULIMIT(P)						     POSIX Programmer's Manual							 ULIMIT(P)

NAME

       ulimit - set or report file size limit

SYNOPSIS

       ulimit [-f][blocks]

DESCRIPTION

       The  ulimit utility shall set or report the file-size writing limit imposed on files written by the shell and its child processes (files of
       any size may be read). Only a process with appropriate privileges can increase the limit.

OPTIONS

       The ulimit utility shall conform to the Base Definitions volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.

       The following option shall be supported:

       -f     Set (or report, if no blocks operand is present), the file size limit in blocks. The -f option shall also be the default case.

OPERANDS

       The following operand shall be supported:

       blocks The number of 512-byte blocks to use as the new file size limit.

STDIN

       Not used.

INPUT FILES

       None.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

       The following environment variables shall affect the execution of ulimit:

       LANG   Provide a default value for the internationalization variables that  are	unset  or  null.  (See	the  Base  Definitions	volume	of
	      IEEE Std 1003.1-2001,  Section  8.2,  Internationalization  Variables  for  the precedence of internationalization variables used to
	      determine the values of locale categories.)

       LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override the values of all the other internationalization variables.

       LC_CTYPE
	      Determine the locale for the interpretation of sequences of bytes of text data as characters (for example, single-byte as opposed to
	      multi-byte characters in arguments).

       LC_MESSAGES
	      Determine the locale that should be used to affect the format and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard error.

       NLSPATH
	      Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing of LC_MESSAGES .

ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS

       Default.

STDOUT

       The  standard  output  shall be used when no blocks operand is present. If the current number of blocks is limited, the number of blocks in
       the current limit shall be written in the following format:

	      "%d
", <number of 512-byte blocks>

       If there is no current limit on the number of blocks, in the POSIX locale the following format shall be used:

	      "unlimited
"

STDERR

       The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.

OUTPUT FILES

       None.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION

       None.

EXIT STATUS

       The following exit values shall be returned:

	0     Successful completion.

       >0     A request for a higher limit was rejected or an error occurred.

CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS

       Default.

       The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE

       Since ulimit affects the current shell execution environment, it is always provided as a shell regular built-in. If it is called in a sepa-
       rate utility execution environment, such as one of the following:

	      nohup ulimit -f 10000
	      env ulimit 10000

       it does not affect the file size limit of the caller's environment.

       Once  a limit has been decreased by a process, it cannot be increased (unless appropriate privileges are involved), even back to the origi-
       nal system limit.

EXAMPLES

       Set the file size limit to 51200 bytes:

	      ulimit -f 100

RATIONALE

       None.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS

       None.

SEE ALSO

       The System Interfaces volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, ulimit()

COPYRIGHT

       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003 Edition, Standard for Information Technol-
       ogy -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 6, Copyright (C) 2001-2003 by the Institute of
       Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the event of any discrepancy between this version and  the  original  IEEE
       and  The  Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard is the referee document. The original Standard can be obtained
       online at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .

IEEE
/The Open Group						       2003								 ULIMIT(P)