How to create special files of type socket?

Question

I need to create serial port socket for kgdb-gdb remote connection.

Just as mkfifo creates a FIFO on your system, how can we create socket files?

Answer 1

The link in the accepted answer by @cidermonkey is great if you're trying to write an app that uses sockets. If you literally just want to create one you can do it in python:

~]# python -c "import socket as s; sock = s.socket(s.AF_UNIX); sock.bind('/tmp/somesocket')"
~]# ll /tmp/somesocket 
srwxr-xr-x. 1 root root 0 Mar  3 19:30 /tmp/somesocket

Or with a tiny C program, e.g., save the following to create-a-socket.c:

#include <fcntl.h>
#include <sys/un.h>
#include <sys/socket.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <unistd.h>

int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
    // The following line expects the socket path to be first argument
    char * mysocketpath = argv[1];
    // Alternatively, you could comment that and set it statically:
    //char * mysocketpath = "/tmp/mysock";
    struct sockaddr_un namesock;
    int fd;
    namesock.sun_family = AF_UNIX;
    strncpy(namesock.sun_path, (char *)mysocketpath, sizeof(namesock.sun_path));
    fd = socket(AF_UNIX, SOCK_DGRAM, 0);
    bind(fd, (struct sockaddr *) &namesock, sizeof(struct sockaddr_un));
    close(fd);
    return 0;
}

Then install gcc, compile it, and ta-da:

~]# gcc -o create-a-socket create-a-socket.c
~]# ./create-a-socket mysock
~]# ll mysock
srwxr-xr-x. 1 root root 0 Mar  3 17:45 mysock