opensolaris man page for signal

signal(3UCB)					     SunOS/BSD Compatibility Library Functions					      signal(3UCB)

NAME
       signal - simplified software signal facilities

SYNOPSIS
       /usr/ucb/cc [ flag ... ] file ...
       #include <signal.h>

       void (*signal(sig, func))()
       int sig;
       void (*func)();

DESCRIPTION
       signal()  is  a	simplified  interface to the more general sigvec(3UCB) facility.  Programs that use signal() in preference to sigvec() are
       more likely to be portable to all systems.

       A signal is generated by some abnormal event, initiated by a user at a terminal (quit, interrupt, stop), by a  program  error  (bus  error,
       etc.),  by  request  of	another program (kill), or when a process is stopped because it wishes to access its control terminal while in the
       background (see termio(7I)). Signals are optionally generated when a process resumes after being stopped, when the  status  of  child  pro-
       cesses  changes,  or  when  input is ready at the control terminal. Most signals cause termination of the receiving process if no action is
       taken; some signals instead cause the process receiving them to be stopped, or are simply discarded if the process has not requested other-
       wise.  Except  for  the	SIGKILL  and SIGSTOP signals, the signal() call allows signals either to be ignored or to interrupt to a specified
       location. See sigvec(3UCB) for a complete list of the signals.

       If func is SIG_DFL, the default action for signal sig is reinstated; this default is termination (with a core image  for  starred  signals)
       except  for  signals marked with o or a dagger.. Signals marked with o are discarded if the action is SIG_DFL; signals marked with a dagger
       cause the process to stop.  If func is SIG_IGN the signal is subsequently ignored and pending instances of the signal are discarded. Other-
       wise, when the signal occurs further occurrences of the signal are automatically blocked and func is called.

       A return from the function unblocks the handled signal and continues the process at the point it was interrupted.

       If  a  caught signal occurs during certain functions,  terminating the call prematurely, the call is automatically restarted. In particular
       this can occur during a read(2) or write(2) on a slow device (such as a terminal; but not a file) and during a wait(3C).

       The value of signal() is the previous (or initial) value of func for the particular signal.

       After a fork(2) or vfork(2) the child inherits all signals.  An exec(2) resets all caught signals to the default  action;  ignored  signals
       remain ignored.

RETURN VALUES
       The previous action is returned on a successful call. Otherwise,-1 is returned and errno is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS
       signal() will fail and no action will take place if the following occurs:

       EINVAL	 sig is not a valid signal number, or is SIGKILL or SIGSTOP.

SEE ALSO
       cc(1B),	kill(1),  exec(2), fcntl(2), fork(2), getitimer(2), getrlimit(2), kill(2), read(2), sigaction(2), write(2), abort(3C), ptrace(3C),
       setjmp(3C), setjmp(3UCB), sigblock(3UCB), signal(3C), signal.h(3HEAD), sigstack(3UCB), sigvec(3UCB), wait(3C), wait(3UCB), termio(7I)

NOTES
       Use of these interfaces should be restricted to only applications written on BSD platforms.  Use of these interfaces with any of the system
       libraries or in multi-threaded applications is unsupported.

       The handler routine func can be declared:

	 void handler(signum) int signum;

       Here signum is the signal number. See sigvec(3UCB) for more information.

SunOS 5.11							    30 Oct 2007 						      signal(3UCB)