CURLMOPT_C...NALTY_SIZE(3)

💅 CURLMOPT_CHUNK_LENGTH_PENALTY_SIZE(3) 💅

okay so bestie, we're in the libcurl manual pages, section 3, and today's main character is CURLMOPT_CHUNK_LENGTH_PENALTY_SIZE(3) — the chunk length threshold for pipelining. yes, that's a long name, no, we're not shortening it, it's iconic as-is 🎀

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✨ NAME ✨

CURLMOPT_CHUNK_LENGTH_PENALTY_SIZE — the chunk length threshold for pipelining, fr fr

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🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

#include <curl/curl.h>

CURLMcode curl_multi_setopt(CURLM *handle, CURLMOPT_CHUNK_LENGTH_PENALTY_SIZE,
                            long size);

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🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

so here's the tea: there's literally no function for this since pipelining was removed in 7.62.0. it's giving retirement era, ngl 💀

but like, historically? you'd pass a long with a size in bytes. the vibe was: if a transfer in a pipeline is currently processing a chunked (Transfer-encoding: chunked) request with a current chunk length larger than CURLMOPT_CHUNK_LENGTH_PENALTY_SIZE(3), then that pipeline is not considered for additional requests — even if it is shorter than CURLMOPT_MAX_PIPELINE_LENGTH(3). yes, even then. the pipeline gets a little time-out in the corner 🙈

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⭐ DEFAULT ⭐

0, which means that penalization is inactive. so by default nobody's in trouble, we're all slaying 🫶

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🌈 PROTOCOLS 🌈

this functionality affects http only. http girlies only, sorry to the rest of y'all 💅

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🔥 EXAMPLE 🔥

int main(void)
{
  CURLM *m = curl_multi_init();
  long maxchunk = 10000;
  curl_multi_setopt(m, CURLMOPT_CHUNK_LENGTH_PENALTY_SIZE, maxchunk);
}

look at her go. maxchunk = 10000, main character energy, no cap 👑

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🧚 AVAILABILITY 🧚

added in curl 7.30.0 — so she's been around a minute, an elder stateswoman of the multi options 🎀

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💖 RETURN VALUE 💖

curl_multi_setopt(3) returns a CURLMcode indicating success or error.

CURLM_OK (0) means everything was OK. non-zero means an error occurred — see libcurl-errors(3) for the full rundown, iykyk 😭

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🍓 SEE ALSO 🍓

• CURLMOPT_CONTENT_LENGTH_PENALTY_SIZE(3)
• CURLMOPT_MAX_PIPELINE_LENGTH(3)
• CURLMOPT_PIPELINING(3)

go read those next bestie, they're lowkey siblings of this one 🌸

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and that's the whole page!! written by the libcurl girlies, dated 2026-10-12 — catch you in the next manpage, mwah 💜✨