ARES_PARSE_PTR_REPLY(3)

✨ ares_parse_ptr_reply — the PTR parser era ✨

ok so bestie, this is the manual page for ares_parse_ptr_reply, living in section 3 of the Library Functions Manual. she's a libc-ares girlie and she has ONE job and she does it slayfully 💅

🌸 NAME 🌸

ares_parse_ptr_reply — parse a reply to a DNS query of type PTR into a hostent

🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

#include <ares.h>

int ares_parse_ptr_reply(const unsigned char *abuf, int alen,
                         const void *addr, int addrlen,
                         int family, struct hostent **host);

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

okay so picture this: you sent out a DNS query of type PTR, the response came back, and now somebody has to make sense of it. that somebody is ares_parse_ptr_reply. she takes the response and parses it into a struct hostent. no cap. 🫶

here's the deets on the parameters:

• abuf and alen — these two give the contents of the response. that's the whole raw reply, right there.
• addr, addrlen, and family — these specify which address was queried for. and listen, important: they are not used to verify the response. not even a little. they are merely used to fill in the address of the struct hostent. so don't come for her thinking she's validating anything, because she is not. 🙈

the resulting struct hostent gets stored in allocated memory, and a pointer to it gets stored into the variable pointed to by host.

⚠️ bestie, this is the part you cannot skip: it is the caller's responsibility to free the resulting host structure using ares_free_hostent(3) when it is no longer needed. that's you. you're the caller. free your girl or she's leaking in memory forever 😭

🔥 RETURN VALUES 🔥

ares_parse_ptr_reply can return any of the following values:

• ARES_SUCCESS — the response was successfully parsed. we ate. 🎀
• ARES_EBADRESP — the response was malformatted. it's giving cursed input 💀
• ARES_ENODATA — the response did not contain an answer to the query. nothing there. ghosted ✨
• ARES_ENOMEM — memory was exhausted. she's tired, your honor 😭

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• ares_gethostbyaddr(3)
• ares_free_hostent(3)

and that's the whole page, bestie — this icon was documented back on 25 July 1998, and she comes to you courtesy of the Library Functions Manual. yes she's vintage, yes she still serves. periodt 💅👑