PAPI_strerror(3)

✨ NAME ✨

okay bestie, welcome to the PAPI_strerror(3) page — this is the one that tells you what a PAPI error code actually means. PAPI_strerror — Returns a string describing the PAPI error code. 💅

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

bestie, this page goes straight into the Detailed Description next, so keep scrolling. no cap, there’s no big synopsis block to memorize here. 🫶

💅 Detailed Description 💅

🌈 C Interface:

#include <papi.h>
char * PAPI_strerror( int errorCode );

🎀 Parameters 🎀

• code — the error code to interpret

🍓 Return values 🍓

• *error — a pointer to the error string.
• NULL — the input error code to PAPI_strerror() is invalid.

So like, PAPI_strerror() returns a pointer to the error message corresponding to the error code code. If the call fails, the function returns the NULL pointer.

🚨 Fortran besties: this function is not implemented in Fortran.

🔥 Example: 🔥

okay this example is giving “handle your PAPI errors before chaos” energy, so here it is exactly:

int ret;
int EventSet = PAPI_NULL;
int native = 0x0;
char error_str[PAPI_MAX_STR_LEN];

ret = PAPI_create_eventset(&EventSet);
if (ret != PAPI_OK)
{
   fprintf(stderr, "PAPI error %d: %s\n", ret, PAPI_strerror(retval));
   exit(1);
}
// Add Total Instructions Executed to our EventSet
ret = PAPI_add_event(EventSet, PAPI_TOT_INS);
if (ret != PAPI_OK)
{
   PAPI_perror( "PAPI_add_event");
   fprintf(stderr,"PAPI_error %d: %s\n", ret, error_str);
   exit(1);
}
// Start counting
ret = PAPI_start(EventSet);
if (ret != PAPI_OK) handle_error(ret);

👑 See also 👑

the whole squad:

• PAPI_perror
• PAPI_set_opt
• PAPI_get_opt
• PAPI_shutdown
• PAPI_set_debug

🧚 Author 🧚

Generated automatically by Doxygen for PAPI from the source code. (yes bestie, the robots wrote this one 🤖💖)

kisses 💋 — this page is from Version 7.2.0.0, dated Wed Jun 25 2025 19:30:49. PAPI_strerror(3) out. periodt. 🫶