.TH DIRREAD 2
.SH NAME
dirread \- read directory
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B #include <u.h>
.br
.B #include <libc.h>
.PP
.B
int dirread(int fd, Dir *buf, long nbytes)
.SH DESCRIPTION
The data returned by a
.IR read (2)
on a directory is a set of complete directory entries
in a machine-independent format, exactly equivalent to
the result of a
.IR stat (2)
on each file or subdirectory in the directory.
.I Dirread
decodes the directory entries into a machine-dependent form.
It reads from
.IR fd
and unpacks the data into
.B Dir
structures in
.I buf
(see
.IR stat (2)
for the layout of a
.BR Dir ).
.I Nbytes
is the size of
.BR buf ;
it should be a multiple of
.BR sizeof(Dir) .
Directory entries have length
.B DIRLEN
(defined in
.BR <libc.h> )
in machine-independent form.
A successful
.I read
of a directory always returns a multiple of
.BR DIRLEN ;
.I dirread
always returns a multiple of
.BR sizeof(Dir) .
.PP
.I Dirread
returns the number of bytes filled in
.BR buf ;
the number returned may be
less than the number requested.
The file offset is advanced by the number of bytes actually read.
.SH SOURCE
.B /sys/src/libc/9sys/dirread.c
.SH SEE ALSO
.IR intro (2),
.IR open (2),
.IR read (2)
.SH DIAGNOSTICS
Sets
.IR errstr .