Where a hostname cannot be resolved, the function returns a RETCODE of -1 and null pointer for HOSTENT. This is in line with the behaviour of versions of IBM EZASOKET that were tested. However, the IBM documentation states that, if the hostname cannot be resolved, the function will return a HOSTENT structure containing the error code. The behaviour of this function may change in future releases. We recommend that application programs rely on the RETCODE value to determine whether the call succeeded, and only inspect the HOSTENT structure if RETCODE is 0.
The GETHOSTBYADDR function is not thread-safe.
Because the native name resolution functions used by Micro Focus are not thread-safe, there is a very small possibility of a race condition occurring and of the function returning incorrect data. However, this is significantly less likely than errors elsewhere in the name resolution system, such as a failing DNS server.