.\" **************************************************************************
.\" *                                  _   _ ____  _
.\" *  Project                     ___| | | |  _ \| |
.\" *                             / __| | | | |_) | |
.\" *                            | (__| |_| |  _ <| |___
.\" *                             \___|\___/|_| \_\_____|
.\" *
.\" * Copyright (C) 1998 - 2020, Daniel Stenberg, <daniel@haxx.se>, et al.
.\" *
.\" * This software is licensed as described in the file COPYING, which
.\" * you should have received as part of this distribution. The terms
.\" * are also available at https://curl.haxx.se/docs/copyright.html.
.\" *
.\" * You may opt to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute and/or sell
.\" * copies of the Software, and permit persons to whom the Software is
.\" * furnished to do so, under the terms of the COPYING file.
.\" *
.\" * This software is distributed on an "AS IS" basis, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY
.\" * KIND, either express or implied.
.\" *
.\" **************************************************************************
.TH curl_easy_init 3 "4 March 2002" "libcurl 7.8.1" "libcurl Manual"
.SH NAME
curl_easy_init - Start a libcurl easy session
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B #include <curl/curl.h>

.BI "CURL *curl_easy_init( );"
.SH DESCRIPTION
This function must be the first function to call, and it returns a CURL easy
handle that you must use as input to other functions in the easy
interface. This call \fBMUST\fP have a corresponding call to
\fIcurl_easy_cleanup(3)\fP when the operation is complete.

If you did not already call \fIcurl_global_init(3)\fP, \fIcurl_easy_init(3)\fP
does it automatically.  This may be lethal in multi-threaded cases, since
\fIcurl_global_init(3)\fP is not thread-safe, and it may result in resource
problems because there is no corresponding cleanup.

You are strongly advised to not allow this automatic behaviour, by calling
\fIcurl_global_init(3)\fP yourself properly.  See the description in
\fBlibcurl\fP(3) of global environment requirements for details of how to use
this function.
.SH RETURN VALUE
If this function returns NULL, something went wrong and you cannot use the
other curl functions.
.SH EXAMPLE
.nf
CURL *curl = curl_easy_init();
if(curl) {
  CURLcode res;
  curl_easy_setopt(curl, CURLOPT_URL, "http://example.com");
  res = curl_easy_perform(curl);
  curl_easy_cleanup(curl);
}
.fi
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.BR curl_easy_cleanup "(3), " curl_global_init "(3), " curl_easy_reset "(3), "
.BR curl_easy_perform "(3) "