1TIMES(2)                   Linux Programmer's Manual                  TIMES(2)
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NAME

6       times - get process times
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SYNOPSIS

9       #include <sys/times.h>
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11       clock_t times(struct tms *buf);
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DESCRIPTION

14       times()  stores  the  current  process times in the struct tms that buf
15       points to.  The struct tms is as defined in <sys/times.h>:
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17           struct tms {
18               clock_t tms_utime;  /* user time */
19               clock_t tms_stime;  /* system time */
20               clock_t tms_cutime; /* user time of children */
21               clock_t tms_cstime; /* system time of children */
22           };
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24       The tms_utime field contains the CPU time spent executing  instructions
25       of  the  calling  process.   The  tms_stime field contains the CPU time
26       spent executing inside the kernel while performing tasks on  behalf  of
27       the calling process.
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29       The  tms_cutime  field contains the sum of the tms_utime and tms_cutime
30       values for all waited-for terminated children.   The  tms_cstime  field
31       contains the sum of the tms_stime and tms_cstime values for all waited-
32       for terminated children.
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34       Times for terminated children (and their descendants) are added  in  at
35       the moment wait(2) or waitpid(2) returns their process ID.  In particu‐
36       lar, times of grandchildren that the children  did  not  wait  for  are
37       never seen.
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39       All times reported are in clock ticks.
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RETURN VALUE

42       times()  returns  the  number of clock ticks that have elapsed since an
43       arbitrary point in the past.  The return value may overflow the  possi‐
44       ble range of type clock_t.  On error, (clock_t) -1 is returned, and er‐
45       rno is set to indicate the error.
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ERRORS

48       EFAULT tms points outside the process's address space.
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CONFORMING TO

51       POSIX.1-2001, POSIX.1-2008, SVr4, 4.3BSD.
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NOTES

54       The number of clock ticks per second can be obtained using:
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56           sysconf(_SC_CLK_TCK);
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58       In POSIX.1-1996 the symbol CLK_TCK (defined in <time.h>)  is  mentioned
59       as obsolescent.  It is obsolete now.
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61       In Linux kernel versions before 2.6.9, if the disposition of SIGCHLD is
62       set to SIG_IGN, then the times of terminated children are automatically
63       included in the tms_cstime and tms_cutime fields, although POSIX.1-2001
64       says that this should happen only if the calling  process  wait(2)s  on
65       its  children.   This  nonconformance  is  rectified in Linux 2.6.9 and
66       later.
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68       On Linux, the buf argument can be specified as NULL,  with  the  result
69       that  times()  just returns a function result.  However, POSIX does not
70       specify this behavior, and most other UNIX  implementations  require  a
71       non-NULL value for buf.
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73       Note that clock(3) also returns a value of type clock_t, but this value
74       is measured in units of CLOCKS_PER_SEC, not the  clock  ticks  used  b