_execve, _wexecve

Article
06/05/2017

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The latest version of this topic can be found at _execve, _wexecve.

Loads and executes new child processes.

Important

This API cannot be used in applications that execute in the Windows Runtime. For more information, see CRT functions not supported with /ZW.

Syntax

intptr_t _execve(   
   const char *cmdname,  
   const char *const *argv,  
   const char *const *envp   
);  
intptr_t _wexecve(   
   const wchar_t *cmdname,  
   const wchar_t *const *argv,  
   const wchar_t *const *envp   
);

Parameters

cmdname
Path of the file to execute.

argv
Array of pointers to parameters.

envp
Array of pointers to environment settings.

Return Value

If successful, these functions do not return to the calling process. A return value of –1 indicates an error, in which case the errno global variable is set.

`errno` value	Description
`E2BIG`	The space required for the arguments and environment settings exceeds 32 KB.
`EACCES`	The specified file has a locking or sharing violation.
`EINVAL`	Invalid parameter.
`EMFILE`	Too many files open (the specified file must be opened to determine whether it is executable).
`ENOENT`	The file or path not found.
`ENOEXEC`	The specified file is not executable or has an invalid executable-file format.
`ENOMEM`	Not enough memory is available to execute the new process; the available memory has been corrupted; or an invalid block exists, indicating that the calling process was not allocated properly.

For more information about these and other return codes, see _doserrno, errno, _sys_errlist, and _sys_nerr.

Remarks

Each of these functions loads and executes a new process, passing an array of pointers to command-line arguments and an array of pointers to environment settings.

_execve and _wexecve validate their parameters. If cmdname is a null pointer, or if argv is a null pointer, pointer to an empty array, or if the array contains an empty string as the first argument, these functions invoke the invalid parameter handler as described in Parameter Validation. If execution is allowed to continue, these functions set errno to EINVAL and return -1. No process is launched.

Requirements

Function	Required header	Optional header
`_execve`	<process.h>	<errno.h>
`_wexecve`	<process.h> or <wchar.h>	<errno.h>

For more compatibility information, see Compatibility.

Example

See the example in _exec, _wexec Functions.

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