NAME

umask - set file mode creation mask

SYNOPSIS

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>

mode_t umask(mode_t mask);

DESCRIPTION

umask() sets the calling process's file mode creation mask (umask) to mask & 0777.

The umask is used by open(2), mkdir(2), and other system calls that create files to modify the permissions placed on newly created files or directories. Specifically, permissions in the umask are turned off from the mode argument to open(2) and mkdir(2) (so, for example, the common umask default value of 022 results in new files being created with permissions 0666 & ~022 = 0644 = rw-r--r-- in the usual case where the mode is specified to open(2) as 0666).

RETURN VALUE

This system call always succeeds and the previous value of the mask is returned.

CONFORMING TO

SVr4, SVID, POSIX, X/OPEN, 4.3BSD

SEE ALSO

chmod(2), mkdir(2), open(2)