Return error codes by Windows Sockets API

Winsock Error Codes
The following is a list of error codes returned by the WSAGetLastErrorcall, along with their descriptions

There are two kinds of errors in Windows Sockets:
task-based (or thread-based) and socket-based. An application can retrieve the task-based error by calling
WSAGetLastError() www.sockets.com/winsock.htm#GetLastError
immediately after a WinSock function fails:

  • reported in a WSAAsyncSelect() www.sockets.com/winsock.htm#AsyncSelect asynchronous FD_ event notification message (which you can extract with the platform independent "message cracker" macro WSAGETSELECTERROR(lParam))
     
  • retrieved by a call to getsockopt() SO_ERROR (which also resets the error value to zero).
    www.sockets.com/winsock.htm#GetSockOpt

WSAStartup() www.sockets.com/winsock.htm#Startup
is the only function that returns an actual error value, rather than simply indicating an error condition (function failure).

This makes sense, since you can't call WSAGetLastError() to retrieve the error value until WSAStartup() succeeds since it will fail with WSANOTINITIALISED www.sockets.com/err_lst1.htm#SANOTINITIALISED

Windows Sockets does not support the Berkeley Sockets error variables errno or h_errno because these per-process global variables don't allow for per-thread error information.

 
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Winsock Error Codes
There are two kinds of errors in Windows Sockets: task-based and socket-based.

Mail Object Error Message
If the send method of the SMTP Object is returning 0 then it means the mail server accepted the e-mail with no error message.

 

 

 
 
  The WINSOCK.H header file provides a macro for h_errno for Berkeley source code compatibility (it simply calls WSAGetLastError() The equivalent macro for errno wasn't included since some applications use errno for non-socket (e.g. file handle) errors.

Most of the error values and their manifest constants (macros) are derived from Berkeley Sockets. The WinSock error values are the BSD error values with a "WinSock API base" error WSABASEERR value added to each of them www.sockets.com/err_lst1.htm#WSABASEERR

The macro for each WinSock API error is the equivalent BSD error's macro, with the three letter "WSA" pre-appended to it. So, for instance, the BSD manifest constant for the "would block" error was defined in the Berkeley Sockets ERRNO.H header file as:

#define  EWOULDBLOCK  35

and WINSOCK.H redefines it as:

#define  WSAEWOULDBLOCK  (WSABASEERR+35)
www.sockets.com/err_lst1.htm#WAEWOULDBLOCK

A few (lower value) WinSock error macro definitions refer to Microsoft C constants. In some cases, these redefine file access errors since Windows NT can treat a socket like a file handle.

A few other (higher value) macros are entirely new to Windows Sockets. They refer to error conditions unique to Windows Sockets, such as invalid WinSock version requests, un-initialized WinSock DLL access, or failed hostname resolution attempts.

All of the Windows Sockets error values have macros defined for them in the WINSOCK.H header file. They all have a WSA prefix and their values are all biased by the WinSock API base error WSABASEERR (10000) value.

The value for WSABASEERR is fairly arbitrary. It's high simply because error values in the Windows API are high values by convention. There is a benefit, though: the unique bias creates identifiable WinSock error values.

What Errors to Expect?

Don't assume the only errors you'll encounter are the ones listed with each function in the WinSock specification. Section 3.3.4 "Error Handling" in the v1.1 Windows Sockets specification warns against this:

Note that this specification defines a recommended set of error codes, and lists the possible errors which may be returned as a result of each function. It may be the case in some implementations that other Windows Sockets error codes will be returned in addition to those listed, and applications should be prepared to handle errors other than those enumerated under each API description.

The specification is a common denominator among WinSock implementations. The errors it lists don't provide "fine resolution" in all cases, which means it doesn't account for some conditions that some network systems can detect.

Finer resolution in error reporting is a double edged sword: with more accurate error values it's easier to diagnose problems when they occur, but it's also more difficult to write an application that can handle all contingencies. The better prepared your application is for any error, the more gracefully you'll handle it, and the easier you'll make your job and the job of your support staff.

 
 
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User Fixable Errors

There are two basic types of errors: those an application user can remedy, and those he cannot and a user should never see an error that is not user-fixable.

Here is a list of user-fixable errors:

WSAEINTR (10004) Interrupted function call
A blocking operation was interrupted by a call to WSACancelBlockingCall

WSAEBADF (10009) Bad file number

WSAEACCES (10013) Permission denied
An attempt was made to access a socket in a way forbidden by its access permissions. An example is using a broadcast address for sendto without broadcast permission being set using setsockopt(SO_BROADCAST)

WSAEFAULT (10014) Bad address
The system detected an invalid pointer address in attempting to use a pointer argument of a call. This error occurs if an application passes an invalid pointer value, or if the length of the buffer is too small. For instance, if the length of an argument which is a struct sockaddr is smaller than sizeof(struct sockaddr).

WSAEINVAL (10022) Invalid argument
Some invalid argument was supplied (for example, specifying an invalid level to the setsockopt function). In some instances, it also refers to the current state of the socket - for instance, calling accept on a socket that is not listening.

WSAEMFILE (10024) Too many open files
Too many open sockets. Each implementation may have a maximum number of socket handles available, either globally, per process or per thread.

WSAEWOULDBLOCK (10035)
Resource temporarily unavailable

This error is returned from operations on non-blocking sockets that cannot be completed immediately, for example recv when no data is queued to be read from the socket. It is a non-fatal error, and the operation should be retried later. It is normal for WSAEWOULDBLOCK to be reported as the result from calling connect on a non-blocking SOCK_STREAM socket, since some time must elapse for the connection to be established.

WSAEINPROGRESS (10036) Operation now in progress
A blocking operation is currently executing. Windows Sockets only allows a single blocking operation to be outstanding per task (or thread), and if any other function call is made (whether or not it references that or any other socket) the function fails with the WSAEINPROGRESS error.

WSAEALREADY (10037) Operation already in progress
An operation was attempted on a non-blocking socket that already had an operation in progress - i.e. calling connect a second time on a non-blocking socket that is already connecting, or canceling an asynchronous request WSAAsyncGetXbyY that has already been canceled or completed.

WSAENOTSOCK (10038) Socket operation on non-socket
An operation was attempted on something that is not a socket. Either the socket handle parameter did not reference a valid socket, or for select, a member of an fd_set was not valid.

WSAEDESTADDRREQ (10039)
Destination address required

A required address was omitted from an operation on a socket. For example, this error will be returned if sendto is called with the remote address of ADDR_ANY

WSAEMSGSIZE (10040) Message too long
A message sent on a datagram socket was larger than the internal message buffer or some other network limit, or the buffer used to receive a datagram into was smaller than the datagram itself.

WSAEPROTOTYPE (10041) Protocol wrong type for socket
A protocol was specified in the socketfunction call that does not support the semantics of the socket type requested. For example, the ARPA Internet UDP protocol cannot be specified with a socket type of SOCK_STREAM

WSAENOPROTOOPT (10042) Bad protocol option
An unknown, invalid or unsupported option or level was specified in a getsockopt or setsockoptcall.

WSAEPROTONOSUPPORT (10043) Protocol not supported
The requested protocol has not been configured into the system, or no implementation for it exists. For example, a socketcall requests a SOCK_DGRAM socket, but specifies a stream protocol.

WSAESOCKTNOSUPPORT (10044) Socket type not supported
The support for the specified socket type does not exist in this address family. For example, the optional type SOCK_RAW might be selected in a socketcall, and the implementation does not support SOCK_RAW sockets at all.

WSAEOPNOTSUPP (10045) Operation not supported
The attempted operation is not supported for the type of object referenced. Usually this occurs when a socket descriptor to a socket that cannot support this operation, for example, trying to accept a connection on a datagram socket.

WSAEPFNOSUPPORT (10046)
Protocol family not supported

The protocol family has not been configured into the system or no implementation for it exists. Has a slightly different meaning to WSAEAFNOSUPPORT but is interchangeable in most cases, and all Windows Sockets functions that return one of these specify WSAEAFNOSUPPORT

WSAEAFNOSUPPORT (10047)
Address family not supported by protocol family
An address incompatible with the requested protocol was used. All sockets are created with an associated "address family" (i.e. AF_INET for Internet Protocols) and a generic protocol type (i.e. SOCK_STREAM). This error will be returned if an incorrect protocol is explicitly requested in the socket call, or if an address of the wrong family is used for a socket, e.g. in sendto.

WSAEADDRINUSE (10048) Address already in use
Only one usage of each socket address (protocol/IP address/port) is normally permitted. This error occurs if an application attempts to bind a socket to an IP address/port that has already been used for an existing socket, or a socket that wasn't closed properly, or one that is still in the process of closing. For server applications that need to bind multiple sockets to the same port number, consider using setsockopt(SO_REUSEADDR). Client applications usually need not call bind at all - connect will choose an unused port automatically.

WSAEADDRNOTAVAIL (10049)
Cannot assign requested address

The requested address is not valid in its context. This normally results from an attempt to bind to an address that is not valid for the local machine, or connect/sendto an address or port that is not valid for a remote machine (e.g. port 0).

WSAENETDOWN (10050) Network is down
A socket operation encountered a dead network. This could indicate a serious failure of the network system (i.e. the protocol stack that the WinSock DLL runs over), the network interface, or the local network itself.

WSAENETUNREACH (10051) Network is unreachable
A socket operation was attempted to an unreachable network. This usually means the local software knows no route to reach the remote host.

WSAENETRESET (10052)
Network dropped connection on reset

The host you were connected to crashed and rebooted. May also be returned by setsockopt if an attempt is made to set SO_KEEPALIVE on a connection that has already failed.

WSAECONNABORTED (10053)
Software caused connection abort

An established connection was aborted by the software in your host machine, possibly due to a data transmission timeout or protocol error

WSAECONNRESET (10054) Connection reset by peer
An existing connection was forcibly closed by the remote host. This normally results if the peer application on the remote host is suddenly stopped, the host is rebooted, or the remote host used a "hard close" (see setsockopt for more information on the SO_LINGER option on the remote socket.)

WSAENOBUFS (10055) No buffer space available.
An operation on a socket could not be performed because the system lacked sufficient buffer space or because a queue was full.

WSAEISCONN (10056) Socket is already connected
A connect request was made on an already connected socket. Some implementations also return this error if sendto is called on a connected SOCK_DGRAM socket (For SOCK_STREAM sockets, the to parameter in sendto is ignored), although other implementations treat this as a legal occurrence.

WSAENOTCONN (10057) Socket is not connected
A request to send or receive data was disallowed because the socket is not connected and (when sending on a datagram socket using sendto) no address was supplied. Any other type of operation might also return this error - for example, setsockoptsetting SO_KEEPALIVE if the connection has been reset.

WSAESHUTDOWN (10058)
Cannot send after socket shutdown

A request to send or receive data was disallowed because the socket had already been shut down in that direction with a previous shutdown call. By calling shutdown a partial close of a socket is requested, which is a signal that sending or receiving or both has been discontinued.

WSAETIMEDOUT (10060) Connection timed out
A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond.

WSAECONNREFUSED (10061) Connection refused
No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it. This usually results from trying to connect to a service that is inactive on the foreign host— i.e. one with no server application running.

WSAEHOSTDOWN (10064) Host is down
A socket operation failed because the destination host was down. A socket operation encountered a dead host. Networking activity on the local host has not been initiated. These conditions are more likely to be indicated by the error WSAETIMEDOUT

WSAEHOSTUNREACH (10065) No route to host
A socket operation was attempted to an unreachable host. This error also occurs when your ISP is intentionally blocking port 25 (the SMTP port) in an attempt to reduce spamming through their systems. See WSAENETUNREACH (10051)

WSAEPROCLIM (10067) Too many processes
A Windows Sockets implementation may have a limit on the number of applications that may use it simultaneously. WSAStartup may fail with this error if the limit has been reached.

WSASYSNOTREADY (10091)
Network subsystem is unavailable

This error is returned by WSAStartup if the Windows Sockets implementation cannot function at this time because the underlying system it uses to provide network services is currently unavailable. Users should check:

  • that the WINSOCK.DLL file is in the current path,
     
  • that the WINSOCK.DLL file is from the same vendor as the underlying protocol stack. They cannot be mixed and matched (WinSock DLLs must be supplied by the same vendor that provided the underlying protocol stack).
     
  • that they are not trying to use more than one Windows Sockets implementation simultaneously. If there is more than one WINSOCK DLL on your system, be sure the first one in the path is appropriate for the network subsystem currently loaded.
     
  • the Windows Sockets implementation documentation to be sure all necessary components are currently installed and configured correctly.

WSAVERNOTSUPPORTED (10092)
WINSOCK.DLL version out of range

The current Windows Sockets implementation does not support the Windows Sockets specification version requested by the application. Check that no old WINSOCK.DLL files are being accessed, or contact the stack vendor to see if an updated WINSOCK.DLL exists.

WSANOTINITIALISED (10093)
Successful WSAStartup not yet performed

Either the application hasn't called WSAStartup, or WSAStartup failed. The application may be accessing a socket which the current active task does not own (i.e. trying to share a socket between tasks) or WSACleanup has been called too many times.

WSAEDISCON (10094) Graceful shutdown in progress
Returned by recv, WSARecvto indicate the remote party has initiated a graceful shutdown sequence.

WSAHOST_NOT_FOUND (11001) Host not found
No such host is known. The name is not an official hostname or alias, or it cannot be found in the database(s) being queried. This error may also be returned for protocol and service queries, and means the specified name could not be found in the relevant database.

WSATRY_AGAIN (11002) Non-authoritative host not found
This is usually a temporary error during hostname resolution and means that the local server did not receive a response from an authoritative server. A retry at some time later may be successful.

WSANO_RECOVERY (11003)
This is a non-recoverable error

This indicates some sort of non-recoverable error occurred during a database lookup. This may be because the database files (e.g. BSD-compatible HOSTS, SERVICES or PROTOCOLS files) could not be found, or a DNS request was returned by the server with a severe error.

WSANO_DATA (11004)
Valid name, no data record of requested type

The requested name is valid and was found in the database, but it does not have the correct associated data being resolved for. The usual example for this is a hostname -> address translation attempt (using gethostbyname or WSAAsyncGetHostByName) which uses the DNS (Domain Name Server), and an MX record is returned but no A record - indicating the host itself exists, but is not directly reachable.

WSA_INVALID_HANDLE (OS dependent)
Specified event object handle is invalid

An application attempts to use an event object, but the specified handle is not valid.

WSA_INVALID_PARAMETER (OS dependent)
One or more parameters are invalid

An application used a Windows Sockets function which directly maps to a Win32 function. The Win32 function is indicating a problem with one or more parameters.

WSAINVALIDPROCTABLE (OS dependent)
Invalid procedure table from service provider

A service provider returned a bogus proc table to WS2_32.DLL. (Usually caused by one or more of the function pointers being NULL.)

WSAINVALIDPROVIDER (OS dependent)
Invalid service provider version number

A service provider returned a version number other than 2.0.

WSA_IO_PENDING (OS dependent)
Overlapped operations will complete later

The application has initiated an overlapped operation which cannot be completed immediately. A completion indication will be given at a later time when the operation has been completed.

WSA_IO_INCOMPLETE (OS dependent)
Overlapped I/O event object not in signaled state

The application has tried to determine the status of an overlapped operation which is not yet completed. Applications that use WSAWaitForMultipleEvents in a polling mode to determine when an overlapped operation has completed will get this error code until the operation is complete.

WSA_NOT_ENOUGH_MEMORY (OS dependent)
Insufficient memory available

An application used a Windows Sockets function which directly maps to a Win32 function. The Win32 function is indicating a lack of required memory resources.

WSAPROVIDERFAILEDINIT (OS dependent)
Unable to initialize a service provider

Either a service provider's DLL could not be loaded (LoadLibrary failed) or the provider's WSPStartup/NSPStartupfunction failed.

WSASYSCALLFAILURE (OS dependent)
System call failure

Returned when a system call that should never fail does. For example, if a call to WaitForMultipleObjects fails or one of the registry functions fails trying to manipulate the protocol/namespace catalogs.

WSA_OPERATION_ABORTED (OS dependent)
Overlapped operation aborted

An overlapped operation was canceled due to the closure of the socket, or the execution of the SIO_FLUSH command in WSAIoctl

   
 
 
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