minimal

• 1 general error
• 2 wrong arguments

bash

taken from Advanced Bash-Scripting Guide

• 1 Catchall for general errors
• 2 Misuse of shell builtins (according to Bash documentation)
• 126 Command invoked cannot execute, Permission problem or command is not an executable
• 127 "command not found", Possible problem with $PATH or a typo
• 128 Invalid argument to exit, exit 3.14159, exit takes only integer args in the range 0 - 255
• 128+n Fatal error signal n, examples follow
• 130 Terminated by fatal error signal 2, which is Control-C
• 137 Terminated signal 9, whic is KILL
• 255 Exit status out of range, exit -1, exit takes only integer args in the range 0 - 255

linux kernel

list taken from /usr/include/asm-generic/errno-base.h. more on man 3 errno.

#define EPERM            1      /* Operation not permitted */
#define ENOENT           2      /* No such file or directory */
#define ESRCH            3      /* No such process */
#define EINTR            4      /* Interrupted system call */
#define EIO              5      /* I/O error */
#define ENXIO            6      /* No such device or address */
#define E2BIG            7      /* Argument list too long */
#define ENOEXEC          8      /* Exec format error */
#define EBADF            9      /* Bad file number */
#define ECHILD          10      /* No child processes */
#define EAGAIN          11      /* Try again */
#define ENOMEM          12      /* Out of memory */
#define EACCES          13      /* Permission denied */
#define EFAULT          14      /* Bad address */
#define ENOTBLK         15      /* Block device required */
#define EBUSY           16      /* Device or resource busy */
#define EEXIST          17      /* File exists */
#define EXDEV           18      /* Cross-device link */
#define ENODEV          19      /* No such device */
#define ENOTDIR         20      /* Not a directory */
#define EISDIR          21      /* Is a directory */
#define EINVAL          22      /* Invalid argument */
#define ENFILE          23      /* File table overflow */
#define EMFILE          24      /* Too many open files */
#define ENOTTY          25      /* Not a typewriter */
#define ETXTBSY         26      /* Text file busy */
#define EFBIG           27      /* File too large */
#define ENOSPC          28      /* No space left on device */
#define ESPIPE          29      /* Illegal seek */
#define EROFS           30      /* Read-only file system */
#define EMLINK          31      /* Too many links */
#define EPIPE           32      /* Broken pipe */
#define EDOM            33      /* Math argument out of domain of func */
#define ERANGE          34      /* Math result not representable */