key_validate(9)

💅 key_validate(9) — from the Kernel API Manual, bestie

Okay so real talk, this one's short and sweet and honestly kind of a vibe check for keys. Stick around, it's like four lines of actual info and I've made it cute. 🎀

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✨ NAME ✨

key_validate — literally just validates a key. That's it. That's the whole job. 🦋

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

int key_validate (const struct key *key );

No cap, that's the exact signature — copy it character for character please, I am begging you. 🫶

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🧚 ARGUMENTS 🧚

• key — the key you want validated. The one under the microscope. The main character of this function, honestly. 👑

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🔥 DESCRIPTION 🔥

So the whole point: it checks that a key is valid. That's the vibe. 💅

Here's the return-value tea, and you're gonna want to memorise this because these negative numbers are highkey iconic:

• It returns 0 if the key is okay — slay, we love a zero. ✨
• It returns -ENOKEY if the key is invalidated.
• It returns -EKEYREVOKED if the key's type has been removed, or if the key has been revoked. Yeah, two situations, same error — the way that it covers both? obsessed. 😭
• It returns -EKEYEXPIRED if the key has expired. RIP to that key, it had a good run. 💀

Not me listing every single error code because every single one of them matters — do not lump them together, bestie, they each mean something different and the kernel will notice. 🙈

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👑 SEE ALSO 👑

• Kernel file ./security/keys/permission.c
• key_task_permission(9) — go read that one next, iykyk 🦋

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That's the whole page, periodt. 🌈 This little gem lives over in ./security/keys, it's dated October 2026, and yeah — it's still key_validate(9) at the end of the day. Mwah. 💖🌸🎀