tty_buffer_alloc(9)

✨ tty_buffer_alloc(9) ✨

okay so this is a page from the Kernel API Manual, and honestly? it's a little guy with a big job. bestie, let's get into it 💅

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🌸 NAME 🌸

tty_buffer_alloc — allocate a tty buffer

like. it does exactly what it says on the tin. no cap.

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🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

struct tty_buffer * tty_buffer_alloc (struct tty_port *port , size_t size );

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🦋 ARGUMENTS 🦋

• port — the tty port. that's your main character here, the whole reason we're doing any of this 🫶
• size — the desired size, measured in characters. how much room do you want, bestie? speak now.

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💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

Allocate a new tty buffer to hold the desired number of characters. simple. iconic. very demure.

but here's the little detail you CANNOT skip: we round our buffers off in 256 character chunks to get better allocation behaviour. highkey obsessed with that. it's giving tidy-up energy, it's giving "we don't do awkward little buffers in this house" ✨ 256 at a time, that's the vibe check, that's the rule.

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🔥 RETURN 🔥

Returns NULL if out of memory — or if the allocation would exceed the per device queue. so yeah, two ways to fail, both of them NULL. do with that what you will 🙈

ngl, check that return value. NULL is not a vibe, it's an error condition. 😭

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⭐ SEE ALSO ⭐

• Kernel file ./drivers/tty/tty_buffer.c
• tty_buffer_lock_exclusive(9)
• tty_buffer_unlock_exclusive(9)
• tty_buffer_space_avail(9)
• tty_buffer_free_all(9)
• tty_buffer_free(9)
• tty_buffer_flush(9)
• __tty_buffer_request_room(9)
• tty_prepare_flip_string(9)
• tty_ldisc_receive_buf(9)
• flush_to_ldisc(9)
• tty_flip_buffer_push(9)
• tty_insert_flip_string_and_push_buffer(9)
• tty_buffer_init(9)
• tty_buffer_set_limit(9)

the whole friend group fr fr. go read them too, they're all slay 💜

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and that's the page, babes 🧚 this one lives under ./drivers/tty and it's dated October 2026, so like — future girlies are gonna be reading this. bye bestie, go allocate responsibly 💅🎀