abort

 

C

Language

Headers

Type support

Program utilities

Variadic function support

Error handling

Dynamic memory management

Date and time utilities

Strings library

Algorithms

Numerics

Input/output support

Localization support

Atomic operations (C11)

Thread support (C11)

Technical Specifications

 

Program support utilities

Program termination
abort exit quick_exit (C11) _Exit (C99)	atexit at_quick_exit (C11) EXIT_SUCCESSEXIT_FAILURE
Communicating with the environment
system	getenvgetenv_s (C11)
Signals
signal raise sig_atomic_t	SIG_DFLSIG_IGN SIG_ERR
Signal types
SIGABRTSIGFPESIGILLSIGINTSIGSEGVSIGTERM
Non-local jumps
setjmp
longjmp
Types
jmp_buf

 

Defined in header <stdlib.h>
void abort(void);		(until C11)
_Noreturn void abort(void);		(since C11)

Causes abnormal program termination unless SIGABRT is being caught by a signal handler passed to signal and the handler does not return.

Functions passed to atexit() are not called. Whether open resources such as files are closed is implementation defined. An implementation defined status is returned to the host environment that indicates unsuccessful execution.

Parameters

(none)

Return value

(none)

Notes

POSIX specifies that the abort() function overrides blocking or ignoring the SIGABRT signal.

Example

Run this code

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
 
int main(void) 
{
    FILE *fp = fopen("data.txt","r");
    if (fp == NULL) {
       fprintf(stderr, "error opening file data.txt in function main()\n");
       abort();
    }
 
    /* Normal processing continues here. */
    fclose(fp);
    printf("Normal Return\n");
    return 0;
}

Output:

error opening file data.txt in function main()

References

• C11 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:2011):

• 7.22.4.1 The abort function (p: 350)

• C99 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1999):

• 7.20.4.1 The abort function (p: 315)

• C89/C90 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1990):

• 4.10.4.1 The abort function

See also

exit	causes normal program termination with cleaning up (function)
atexit	registers a function to be called on exit() invocation (function)
quick_exit (C11)	causes normal program termination without completely cleaning up (function)
C++ documentation for abort