util-linux is a standard package of the Linux

Linux

Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...

 operating system

Operating system

An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...

. A fork, util-linux-ng—with ng meaning "next generation"—was created when development stalled, but as of January 2011 has been renamed back to util-linux, and is the official version of the package.

It includes the following utilities:

• addpart
• agetty
  Getty (Unix)
  getty, short for "get teletype", is a Unix program running on a host computer that manages physical or virtual terminals . When it detects a connection, it prompts for a username and runs the 'login' program to authenticate the user....
  
  
• arch (deprecated in favor of uname or arch from coreutils)
• blkid
• blockdev
• cal
  Cal (Unix)
  ' is a standard program on Unix and Unix-like operating systems that prints an ASCII calendar of the given month or year. If the user does not specify any command-line options, cal will print a calendar of the current month.- Examples : $ cal...
  
  
• cfdisk
  Cfdisk
  cfdisk is a Linux partition editor, similar to fdisk, but with a different user interface . It is part of the util-linux package of Linux utility programs.Originally written in 1992, the current version is 2.12r....
  
  
• chfn
• chkdupexe
• chrt
• chsh
  Chsh
  chsh is a command on Unix-like operating systems that is used to change a login shell. Users can either supply the pathname of the shell that they wish to change to on the command line, or supply no arguments, in which case chsh allows the user to change the shell interactively.chsh is a setuid...
  
  
• clock
• col
• colcrt
• colrm
• column
• ctrlaltdel
• cytune
• ddate (no longer included by default)
• delpart
• dmesg
  Dmesg
  dmesg is a command on most Linux and Unix based operating systems that prints the message buffer of the kernel.-Booting:...
  
  
• elvtune (obsolete since Linux kernel version 2.6.9)
• fallocate
• fdformat
  Fdformat
  Fdformat is the name of two unrelated programs:* A command-line tool for Linux that "low-level formats" a floppy disk.* A DOS tool written in Pascal by Christoph H. Hochstätter that allows users to format floppy disks to a higher than usual density, enabling the user to store up to 300 kilobytes...
  
  
• fdisk
  Fdisk
  On personal computer operating systems, fdisk is a commonly used name for a command-line utility that provides disk partitioning functions...
  
  
• findfs
• findmnt
• flock
• fsck
  Fsck
  The system utility fsck is a tool for checking the consistency of a file system in Unix and Unix-like operating systems such as Linux.-Use:...
  
  
• fsck
  Fsck
  The system utility fsck is a tool for checking the consistency of a file system in Unix and Unix-like operating systems such as Linux.-Use:...
  
  .cramfs
  Cramfs
  The compressed ROM file system is a free read-only Linux file system designed for simplicity and space-efficiency. It is mainly used in embedded systems and small-footprint systems....
  
  
• fsck
  Fsck
  The system utility fsck is a tool for checking the consistency of a file system in Unix and Unix-like operating systems such as Linux.-Use:...
  
  .minix
  MINIX file system
  -History:MINIX was written from scratch by Andrew S. Tanenbaum in the 1980s, as a Unix-like operating system whose source code could be used freely in education...
  
  
• fsfreeze
• fstrim
• getopt
  Getopt
  getopt is a C library function used to parse command-line options.It is also the name of a Unix program for parsing command line arguments in shell scripts.- History :A long standing issue with command line programs was how to specify options;...
  
  
• hexdump
• hwclock, query and set the hardware clock (RTC)
• ionice
• ipcmk
• ipcrm
  Ipcrm
  The ipcrm command will mark System Vinterprocess communication API kernel entities for removal,deferred until the last connected process detaches.System V IPC kernel entities are:*Shared memory segments*Message queues*Semaphore arrays...
  
  
• ipcs
  Ipcs
  The ipcs command will list System Vinterprocess communication API kernel entities to stdout.System V IPC kernel entities are:*Shared memory segments*Message queues*Semaphore arrays...
  
  
• isosize
• kill
  Kill (Unix)
  In computing, kill is a command that is used in several popular operating systems to send signals to running processes, for example to request the termination of this process.-Unix and Unix-like:...
  
  
• ldattach
• line (deprecated in favor of head
  Head (Unix)
  head is a program on Unix and Unix-like systems used to display the first few lines of a text file or piped data. The command syntax is: head [options] <file_name>...
  
  )
• logger
• login
• look
• losetup
• lsblk
• lscpu
• mcookie
• mesg
  Mesg
  mesg is a Unix command that sets or reports the permission other users have to write to your terminal using the talk and write commands. It is invoked as:mesg [y|n]The 'y' and 'n' options respectively allow and disallow write access to your terminal...
  
  
• mkfs
  Mkfs
  mkfs is the Linux/GNU command for formatting a disk partition with a specific filesystem.- Syntax :The basic syntax is: mkfs -t type device...
  
  
• mkfs
  Mkfs
  mkfs is the Linux/GNU command for formatting a disk partition with a specific filesystem.- Syntax :The basic syntax is: mkfs -t type device...
  
  .bfs
  Boot File System
  The Boot File System was used on UnixWare to store files necessary to its boot process....
  
  
• mkfs
  Mkfs
  mkfs is the Linux/GNU command for formatting a disk partition with a specific filesystem.- Syntax :The basic syntax is: mkfs -t type device...
  
  .cramfs
  Cramfs
  The compressed ROM file system is a free read-only Linux file system designed for simplicity and space-efficiency. It is mainly used in embedded systems and small-footprint systems....
  
  
• mkfs
  Mkfs
  mkfs is the Linux/GNU command for formatting a disk partition with a specific filesystem.- Syntax :The basic syntax is: mkfs -t type device...
  
  .minix
  Minix
  MINIX is a Unix-like computer operating system based on a microkernel architecture created by Andrew S. Tanenbaum for educational purposes; MINIX also inspired the creation of the Linux kernel....
  
  
• mkswap
• more
• mount
  Mount (Unix)
  The Unix command line utility mount instructs the operating system that a file system is ready to use, and associates it with a particular point in the system's file system hierarchy . The counterpart umount instructs the operating system that the file system should be disassociated from its mount...
  
  
• mountpoint
• namei
• newgrp (deprecated in favor of newgrp from shadow-utils)
• nologin
• partx
• pg
• pivot_root
• raw
• readprofile
• rename
• renice
  Nice (Unix)
  nice is a program found on Unix and Unix-like operating systems such as Linux. nice directly maps to a kernel call of the same name. For a given process, it changes the priority in the kernel's scheduler. A niceness of −20 is the highest priority and 19 or 20 is the lowest priority...
  
  
• reset
• rev
• rtcwake
• script
  Script (Unix)
  script is a Unix utility that records a tty session. scriptreplay offers a replay function to script. script captures the session in file name typescript by default, to specify a different filename follow the script command with a space and the filename as such: script recorded_session.Ttyrec...
  
  
• scriptreplay
• setarch (including architecture symlinks such as i386, linux32, linux64, x86_64, etc.)
• setsid
• setterm
• sfdisk
• swaplabel
• swapoff
• swapon
• switch_root
• tailf
• taskset
• tunelp
• ul
• umount
• unshare
• uuidd
• uuidgen
• vigr (deprecated in favor of vigr from shadow-utils)
• vipw
  Vipw
  vipw is a small computer program which enables a Unix system administrator to comfortably edit the "passwd" and "Shadow password" files. It comes bundled in the "Shadow" software package....
  
   (deprecated in favor of vipw from shadow-utils)
• whereis
  Whereis
  whereis is a Unix command used to locate some special files of a Unix command like the binary, source and manual page files. Unix' which is usually preferred to locate binary file, because it's POSIX and it can identify shell aliases....
  
  
• wipefs
• write
  Write (Unix)
  write can refer to several Unix commands. All known variations of write are used to write messages to another user. The most popular variation sends a message directly to another user's TTY.-Usage:The syntax for the write command is:...
  
  

Utilities that used to be included, but are now removed:

• fastboot
• fasthalt
• halt
• initctl
• ramsize (was a symlink to rdev)
• rdev
• reboot
• rootflags (was a symlink to rdev)
• shutdown
• simpleinit
• vidmode (was a symlink to rdev)

External links

• Git repository on kernel.org (primary)
• Git repository on GitHub (backup)
• [ftp://ftp.infradead.org/pub/util-linux/ FTP at infradead.org]