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maurer/libc

Raw bindings to platform APIs for Rust

libc - Raw FFI bindings to platforms' system libraries

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libc provides all of the definitions necessary to easily interoperate with C
code (or "C-like" code) on each of the platforms that Rust supports. This
includes type definitions (e.g. c_int), constants (e.g. EINVAL) as well as
function headers (e.g. malloc).

This crate exports all underlying platform types, functions, and constants under
the crate root, so all items are accessible as libc::foo. The types and values
of all the exported APIs match the platform that libc is compiled for.

Windows API bindings are not included in this crate. If you are looking for
WinAPI bindings, consider using crates like windows-sys.

More detailed information about the design of this library can be found in its
associated RFC.

v1.0 Roadmap

Currently, libc has two active branches: main for the upcoming v1.0 release,
and libc-0.2 for the currently published version. By default all pull requests
should target main; once reviewed, they can be cherry picked to the libc-0.2
branch if needed.

We will stop making new v0.2 releases once v1.0 is released.

See the section in CONTRIBUTING.md for more
details.

Usage

Add the following to your Cargo.toml:

[dependencies]
libc = "0.2"

Features

  • std: by default libc links to the standard library. Disable this feature
    to remove this dependency and be able to use libc in #![no_std] crates.

  • extra_traits: all structs implemented in libc are Copy and Clone.
    This feature derives Debug, Eq, Hash, and PartialEq.

Rust version support

The minimum supported Rust toolchain version is currently Rust 1.63.

Increases to the MSRV are allowed to change without a major (i.e. semver-
breaking) release in order to avoid a ripple effect in the ecosystem. A policy
for when this may change is a work in progress.

libc may continue to compile with Rust versions older than the current MSRV
but this is not guaranteed.

Platform support

You can see the platform(target)-specific docs on docs.rs, select a platform
you want to see.

See ci/verify-build.sh for
the platforms on which libc is guaranteed to build for each Rust toolchain.
The test-matrix at GitHub Actions and Cirrus CI show the platforms in which
libc tests are run.

License

This project is licensed under either of

at your option.

Contributing

We welcome all people who want to contribute. Please see the
contributing instructions for more information.

Contributions in any form (issues, pull requests, etc.) to this project must
adhere to Rust's Code of Conduct.

Unless you explicitly state otherwise, any contribution intentionally submitted
for inclusion in libc by you, as defined in the Apache-2.0 license, shall be
dual licensed as above, without any additional terms or conditions.

Languages

Rust98.1%C0.8%Shell0.6%Dockerfile0.4%Python0.0%RenderScript0.0%
Apache License 2.0
Created September 11, 2025
Updated September 11, 2025