Next: Signaling Another Process, Up: Generating Signals

#### 24.6.1 Signaling Yourself

A process can send itself a signal with the `raise` function. This function is declared in `signal.h`.

— Function: int raise (int signum)

> The `raise` function sends the signal signum to the calling process. It returns zero if successful and a nonzero value if it fails. About the only reason for failure would be if the value of signum is invalid.

— Function: int gsignal (int signum)

> The `gsignal` function does the same thing as `raise`; it is provided only for compatibility with SVID.

One convenient use for `raise` is to reproduce the default behavior of a signal that you have trapped. For instance, suppose a user of your program types the SUSP character (usually `C-z`; see Special Characters) to send it an interactive stop signal (`SIGTSTP`), and you want to clean up some internal data buffers before stopping. You might set this up like this:

         #include <signal.h>

         /* When a stop signal arrives, set the action back to the default
            and then resend the signal after doing cleanup actions. */

         void
         tstp_handler (int sig)
         {
           signal (SIGTSTP, SIG_DFL);
           /* Do cleanup actions here. */
           ...
           raise (SIGTSTP);
         }

         /* When the process is continued again, restore the signal handler. */

         void
         cont_handler (int sig)
         {
           signal (SIGCONT, cont_handler);
           signal (SIGTSTP, tstp_handler);
         }

         /* Enable both handlers during program initialization. */

         int
         main (void)
         {
           signal (SIGCONT, cont_handler);
           signal (SIGTSTP, tstp_handler);
           ...
         }

Portability note: `raise` was invented by the ISO C committee. Older systems may not support it, so using `kill` may be more portable. See Signaling Another Process.