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SETNS(2) Linux Programmer's Manual SETNS(2)

NAME

     setns - reassociate thread with a namespace

SYNOPSIS

     #define _GNU_SOURCE             /* See feature_test_macros(7) */
     #include <sched.h>

     int setns(int fd, int nstype);

DESCRIPTION

     Given a file descriptor referring to a namespace, reassociate the call-
     ing thread with that namespace.

     The fd argument is a file descriptor referring to one of the  namespace
     entries  in  a /proc/[pid]/ns/ directory; see namespaces(7) for further
     information on /proc/[pid]/ns/.  The calling thread will  be  reassoci-
     ated  with  the  corresponding  namespace,  subject  to any constraints
     imposed by the nstype argument.

     The nstype argument specifies  which  type  of  namespace  the  calling
     thread  may  be  reassociated  with.  This argument can have one of the
     following values:

     0      Allow any type of namespace to be joined.

     CLONE_NEWCGROUP (since Linux 4.6)
            fd must refer to a cgroup namespace.

     CLONE_NEWIPC (since Linux 3.0)
            fd must refer to an IPC namespace.

     CLONE_NEWNET (since Linux 3.0)
            fd must refer to a network namespace.

     CLONE_NEWNS (since Linux 3.8)
            fd must refer to a mount namespace.

     CLONE_NEWPID (since Linux 3.8)
            fd must refer to a descendant PID namespace.

     CLONE_NEWUSER (since Linux 3.8)
            fd must refer to a user namespace.

     CLONE_NEWUTS (since Linux 3.0)
            fd must refer to a UTS namespace.

     Specifying nstype as 0 suffices if the caller knows (or does not  care)
     what  type  of  namespace  is  referred to by fd.  Specifying a nonzero
     value for nstype is useful if the caller does not  know  what  type  of
     namespace  is  referred to by fd and wants to ensure that the namespace
     is of a particular type.  (The caller might not know the  type  of  the
     namespace  referred  to  by  fd  if  the  file descriptor was opened by
     another process and, for example, passed  to  the  caller  via  a  UNIX
     domain socket.)

     If  fd refers to a PID namespaces, the semantics are somewhat different
     from other namespace types: reassociating the calling thread with a PID
     namespace  changes  only  the  PID  namespace that subsequently created
     child processes of the caller will be placed in; it does not change the
     PID namespace of the caller itself.  Reassociating with a PID namespace
     is allowed only if the PID namespace specified by fd  is  a  descendant
     (child,  grandchild,  etc.)   of  the PID namespace of the caller.  For
     further details on PID namespaces, see pid_namespaces(7).

     A process reassociating itself with a  user  namespace  must  have  the
     CAP_SYS_ADMIN  capability  in the target user namespace.  Upon success-
     fully joining a user namespace, a process is granted  all  capabilities
     in  that  namespace,  regardless  of  its user and group IDs.  A multi-
     threaded process may not change user namespace with setns().  It is not
     permitted  to  use  setns() to reenter the caller's current user names-
     pace.  This prevents  a  caller  that  has  dropped  capabilities  from
     regaining  those capabilities via a call to setns().  For security rea-
     sons, a process can't join a  new  user  namespace  if  it  is  sharing
     filesystem-related  attributes  (the  attributes  whose sharing is con-
     trolled by the clone(2) CLONE_FS flag) with another process.  For  fur-
     ther details on user namespaces, see user_namespaces(7).

     A  process  may not be reassociated with a new mount namespace if it is
     multithreaded.  Changing the mount namespace requires that  the  caller
     possess  both  CAP_SYS_CHROOT and CAP_SYS_ADMIN capabilities in its own
     user namespace and CAP_SYS_ADMIN in the target  mount  namespace.   See
     user_namespaces(7)  for  details  on the interaction of user namespaces
     and mount namespaces.

     Using setns() to change the caller's cgroup namespace does  not  change
     the caller's cgroup memberships.

RETURN VALUE

     On success, setns() returns 0.  On failure, -1 is returned and errno is
     set to indicate the error.

ERRORS

     EBADF  fd is not a valid file descriptor.

     EINVAL fd refers to a namespace whose type does not match  that  speci-
            fied in nstype.

     EINVAL There  is  problem with reassociating the thread with the speci-
            fied namespace.

     EINVAL The caller tried to join an ancestor (parent,  grandparent,  and
            so on) PID namespace.

     EINVAL The  caller  attempted to join the user namespace in which it is
            already a member.

     EINVAL The caller shares filesystem (CLONE_FS)  state  (in  particular,
            the root directory) with other processes and tried to join a new
            user namespace.

     EINVAL The caller is multithreaded and tried to join a new user  names-
            pace.

     ENOMEM Cannot allocate sufficient memory to change the specified names-
            pace.

     EPERM  The calling thread did not have the required capability for this
            operation.

VERSIONS

     The  setns() system call first appeared in Linux in kernel 3.0; library
     support was added to glibc in version 2.14.

CONFORMING TO

     The setns() system call is Linux-specific.

NOTES

     Not all of the attributes that can be shared when a new thread is  cre-
     ated using clone(2) can be changed using setns().

EXAMPLE

     The  program  below  takes  two  or more arguments.  The first argument
     specifies  the  pathname  of  a   namespace   file   in   an   existing
     /proc/[pid]/ns/  directory.   The remaining arguments specify a command
     and its arguments.  The program opens the namespace  file,  joins  that
     namespace using setns(), and executes the specified command inside that
     namespace.

     The following shell session demonstrates the use of this program  (com-
     piled  as  a binary named ns_exec) in conjunction with the CLONE_NEWUTS
     example program in the clone(2) man page (complied as  a  binary  named
     newuts).

     We  begin  by  executing  the  example program in clone(2) in the back-
     ground.  That program creates a child in a separate UTS namespace.  The
     child  changes  the  hostname in its namespace, and then both processes
     display the hostnames in their UTS namespaces, so that we can see  that
     they are different.

         $  su                    #  Need privilege for namespace operations
         Password: # ./newuts bizarro  &  [1]  3549  clone()  returned  3550
         uts.nodename  in  child:   bizarro uts.nodename in parent: antero #
         uname -n             # Verify hostname in the shell antero

     We then run the program shown below,  using  it  to  execute  a  shell.
     Inside  that  shell,  we verify that the hostname is the one set by the
     child created by the first program:

         # ./ns_exec /proc/3550/ns/uts /bin/bash #  uname  -n              #
         Executed in shell started by ns_exec bizarro

 Program source
     #define  _GNU_SOURCE  #include  <fcntl.h>  #include  <sched.h> #include
     <unistd.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <stdio.h>

     #define errExit(msg)    do { perror(msg); exit(EXIT_FAILURE); \
                             } while (0)

     int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
         int fd;

         if (argc < 3) {
             fprintf(stderr, "%s /proc/PID/ns/FILE cmd args...\n", argv[0]);
             exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
         }

         fd  = open(argv[1], O_RDONLY); /* Get file descriptor for namespace
     */
         if (fd == -1)
             errExit("open");

         if (setns(fd, 0) == -1)       /* Join that namespace */
             errExit("setns");

         execvp(argv[2], &argv[2]);    /* Execute a command in namespace */
         errExit("execvp"); }