linux man page for pthread_detach

PTHREAD_DETACH(3)					     Linux Programmer's Manual						 PTHREAD_DETACH(3)

NAME
       pthread_detach - detach a thread

SYNOPSIS
       #include <pthread.h>

       int pthread_detach(pthread_t thread);

       Compile and link with -pthread.

DESCRIPTION
       The  pthread_detach()  function	marks  the  thread identified by thread as detached.  When a detached thread terminates, its resources are
       automatically released back to the system without the need for another thread to join with the terminated thread.

       Attempting to detach an already detached thread results in unspecified behavior.

RETURN VALUE
       On success, pthread_detach() returns 0; on error, it returns an error number.

ERRORS
       EINVAL thread is not a joinable thread.

       ESRCH  No thread with the ID thread could be found.

CONFORMING TO
       POSIX.1-2001.

NOTES
       Once a thread has been detached, it can't be joined with pthread_join(3) or be made joinable again.

       A new thread can be created in a detached state using pthread_attr_setdetachstate(3) to set the detached attribute of the attr argument	of
       pthread_create(3).

       The  detached  attribute merely determines the behavior of the system when the thread terminates; it does not prevent the thread from being
       terminated if the process terminates using exit(3) (or equivalently, if the main thread returns).

       Either pthread_join(3) or pthread_detach() should be called for each thread that an application creates, so that system resources  for  the
       thread can be released.	(But note that the resources of all threads are freed when the process terminates.)

EXAMPLE
       The following statement detaches the calling thread:

	   pthread_detach(pthread_self());

SEE ALSO
       pthread_attr_setdetachstate(3), pthread_cancel(3), pthread_create(3), pthread_exit(3), pthread_join(3), pthreads(7)

COLOPHON
       This  page is part of release 3.27 of the Linux man-pages project.  A description of the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
       be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.

Linux								    2008-11-27							 PTHREAD_DETACH(3)