from small one page howto to huge articles all in one place
Last additions:
May 25th. 2007:
April, 26th. 2006:
| 
PAM_START
Section: Linux-PAM Manual (3) Updated: 02/02/2026 Index
Return to Main Contents
NAME
pam_start, pam_start_confdir - initialization of PAM transaction
SYNOPSIS
#include <security/pam_appl.h>
-
int pam_start(const char *service_name, const char *user, const struct pam_conv *pam_conversation, pam_handle_t **pamh);
-
int pam_start_confdir(const char *service_name, const char *user, const struct pam_conv *pam_conversation, const char *confdir, pam_handle_t **pamh);
DESCRIPTION
The
pam_start
function creates the PAM context and initiates the PAM transaction. It is the first of the PAM functions that needs to be called by an application. The transaction state is contained entirely within the structure identified by this handle, so it is possible to have multiple transactions in parallel. But it is not possible to use the same handle for different transactions, a new one is needed for every new context.
The
service_name
argument specifies the name of the service to apply and will be stored as PAM_SERVICE item in the new context. The policy for the service will be read from the file
/etc/pam.d/service_name
or, if that file does not exist, from
/etc/pam.conf.
The
user
argument can specify the name of the target user and will be stored as PAM_USER item. If the argument is NULL, the module has to ask for this item if necessary.
The
pam_conversation
argument points to a
struct pam_conv
describing the conversation function to use. An application must provide this for direct communication between a loaded module and the application.
Following a successful return (PAM_SUCCESS) the contents of
pamh
is a handle that contains the PAM context for successive calls to the PAM functions. In an error case is the content of
pamh
undefined.
The
pam_handle_t
is a blind structure and the application should not attempt to probe it directly for information. Instead the PAM library provides the functions
pam_set_item(3)
and
pam_get_item(3). The PAM handle cannot be used for multiple authentications at the same time as long as
pam_end
was not called on it before.
The
pam_start_confdir
function behaves like the
pam_start
function but it also allows setting
confdir
argument with a path to a directory to override the default (/etc/pam.d) path for service policy files. If the
confdir
is NULL, the function works exactly the same as
pam_start.
RETURN VALUES
PAM_ABORT
-
General failure.
PAM_BUF_ERR
-
Memory buffer error.
PAM_SUCCESS
-
Transaction was successfully started.
PAM_SYSTEM_ERR
-
System error, for example a NULL pointer was submitted instead of a pointer to data.
SEE ALSO
pam_get_data(3),
pam_set_data(3),
pam_end(3),
pam_strerror(3)
Index
- NAME
-
- SYNOPSIS
-
- DESCRIPTION
-
- RETURN VALUES
-
- SEE ALSO
-
| 
|
|
- Running on 
-
:
