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.TH "PROCESS-KEYRING" 7 2016-11-01 Linux "Linux Programmer's Manual"
.SH NAME
process-keyring \- per-process shared keyring
.SH DESCRIPTION
The process keyring is a keyring used to anchor keys on behalf of a process.
It is only created when a process requests it.
.P
A special serial number value,
.BR KEY_SPEC_PROCESS_KEYRING ,
is defined that
can be used in lieu of the calling process's process keyring's actual serial
number.
.P
From the keyctl utility, '\fB@p\fP' can be used instead of a numeric key ID in
much the same way, but as keyctl is a program run after forking, this is of no
utility.
.P
A process's process keyring is inherited across
.BR clone (2)
with
.B CLONE_THREAD
and is cleared by
.BR execve (2).
The process keyring will be destroyed when the last
thread that refers to it exits.
.P
If a process doesn't have a process keyring when it is accessed, then the
process keyring will be created if the keyring is to be modified, otherwise
error
.B ENOKEY
will be issued.
.SH SEE ALSO
.ad l
.nh
.BR keyctl (1),
.BR keyctl (3),
.BR keyrings (7),
.BR persistent\-keyring (7),
.BR process\-keyring (7),
.BR session\-keyring (7),
.BR thread\-keyring (7),
.BR user\-keyring (7),
.BR user\-session\-keyring (7)