pam_open_session(3)

pam_open_session3

Open a user session

Usage

#include <sys/types.h>

#include <security/pam_appl.h>

int

pam_open_session(pam_handle_t *pamh, int flags);

Overview

The pam_open_session() sets up a user session for a previously authenticated user. The session should later be torn down by a call to pam_close_session(3).

The flags argument is the binary or of zero or more of the following values:

PAM_SILENT

Do not emit any messages.

If any other bits are set, pam_open_session() will return PAM_BAD_CONSTANT.

Return values

The pam_open_session() function returns one of the following values:

[PAM_SUCCESS]

Success.

[PAM_ABORT]

General failure.

[PAM_BAD_CONSTANT]

Bad constant.

[PAM_BUF_ERR]

Memory buffer error.

[PAM_CONV_ERR]

Conversation failure.

[PAM_PERM_DENIED]

Permission denied.

[PAM_SERVICE_ERR]

Error in service module.

[PAM_SESSION_ERR]

Session failure.

[PAM_SYSTEM_ERR]

System error.

Releases

76 releases since FreeBSD 3.1-RELEASE; the text changed 17 times.

  1. 3.1–4.3
  2. 4.4–4.11
  3. 5.0
  4. 5.1
  5. 5.2–5.2.1
  6. 5.3–5.5
  7. 6.0–6.3
  8. 6.4
  9. 7.0
  10. 7.1–9.1
  11. 9.2
  12. 9.3–10.0
  13. 10.1–11.2
  14. 11.3–11.4
  15. 12.0–12.2
  16. 12.3–13.2
  17. 13.3–14.5
  18. 15.0–16.0

Standards

X/Open Single Sign-On Service (XSSO) - Pluggable Authentication Modules, June 1997.

Authors

The pam_open_session() function and this manual page were developed for the FreeBSD Project by ThinkSec AS and Network Associates Laboratories, the Security Research Division of Network Associates, Inc. under DARPA/SPAWAR contract N66001-01-C-8035 (“CBOSS”), as part of the DARPA CHATS research program.

The OpenPAM library is maintained by Dag-Erling Smørgrav ⟨[email protected]⟩.

From base 16.0-CURRENT-20261027-61c70dc16a79 in FreeBSD 16.0-CURRENT (2026-10-27). Parsed by carta from the page's mdoc source.