SetHandleInformation() Linux equivalent

Question

Hi,

for a TCP Server Class I need a Linux function, which does what SetHandleInformation(, HANDLE_FLAG_INHERIT, 0) do under Windows. I've already searched the web after a Linux equivalent, but I didn't find anything useful. The only reason I need that function is to make the socket handle inheritable to child processes. So in case there is no Linux SetHandleInformation(), is there another way to do this under Linux?

Answer 1

File descriptors in Linux are inherited by child processes by default. To alter that, you use the fcntl() function. The following invocation will set the "close-on-exec" flag on the socket, which is equivalent to making it non-inheritable.

fcntl(socket, F_SETFD, FD_CLOEXEC);

To do the opposite (make the socket inheritable, the default) is just:

fcntl(socket, F_SETFD, 0);