What are setjmp and longjmp in C?

Normal program flow in C follows function calls and branching constructs (if, while etc). The functions setjmp and longjmp introduce another kind of program flow.

#include <setjmp.h>
int setjmp(jmp_buf env);
void longjmp(jmp_buf env, int val);

In its simplest use, the process calls setjmp somewhere, then at some time later calls longjmp. Roughly, the call to longjmp restores the process in the state that it existed when it called setjmp. Thus, this program is an infinite loop:

#include <setjmp.h>
#include <stdio.h>

jmp_buf buf;

int main(void) {
  int r = setjmp(buf);
  printf("r = %d\n", r);
  longjmp(buf, 42);
  return 0;
}

... which prints:

% ./a.out
r = 0
r = 42
r = 42
r = 42
r = 42
r = 42
r = 42
...

This loops forever, since the process state at setjmp led to the call to longjmp. Thus, the process makes the calls setjmp, longjmp, longjmp, longjmp, ad infinitum. (Actually, I think this pattern causes undefined behavior. The setjmp and longjmp calls are supposed to come in pairs.)

The program needs a way, immediately after the setjmp call, to determine whether it just set the jump or it had its state restored. The return value of setjmp provides this. After a normal call to setjmp, it returns 0. When the state is restored after a longjmp, the return value is provided by the longjmp call; this is what the second argument to longjmp provides. So this program does not infinite loop:

#include <setjmp.h>
#include <stdio.h>

jmp_buf buf;

int main(void) {
  switch (setjmp(buf)) {
    case 0:
      printf("I just set jump\n");
      longjmp(buf, 42);
      break;
    case 42:
      printf("Returned from longjmp\n");
      break;
    default:
      fprintf(stderr, "We shouldn't get here!\n");
  }

  return 0;
}

This prints:

% ./a.out
I just set jump
Returned from longjmp

The man page says that setjmp “saves its calling environment” in buf, and longjmp “restores the environment”. It’s a bit vague on what that “environment” is, though. Let’s find out in a future post.

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