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benmmurphy
Asked: 2012-02-11 09:01:44 +0800 CST

Create Unix Named Socket from the Command Line

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Is there a command similar to mkfifo but for domain sockets?

unix domain socket

4 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    There is no exact equivalent of mkfifo for socket, i.e. there is no command that just creates a "hanging" socket. This is for historical reason: server's function bind(), the one that creates a socket name/inode in the filesystem, fails if the name is already used. In other words, server cannot operate on a pre-existing socket.

    So if you'd created socket earlier, it would need to be removed by the server anyway first. No benefit. As you see with Gregory's answer, you can create a socket IF you keep a server for it, such as netcat. Once a server is gone, the old socket is gone. A new server has a new socket, and all clients need to re-connect, despite the socket's name being identical.

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  2. Most recent netcat (nc) and similar programs (socat as far as I know) have domain socket options.
    Else, you can have a look at ucspi-unix

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  3. You can use python:

    python -c "import socket as s; sock = s.socket(s.AF_UNIX); sock.bind('/tmp/test.sock')"

    Also C, see this answer.

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  4. I simply use netcat and stay listening in such a case:

    nc -lkU aSocket.sock

    you should use netcat-openbsd. netcat-traditional does not have -U switch which is for Unix Domain socket.

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