sysctl - configure kernel parameters at runtime
sysctl [
options] [
variable[
=value]] [...]
sysctl -p [
file or
regexp] [...]
sysctl is used to modify kernel parameters at runtime. The parameters
available are those listed under /proc/sys/. Procfs is required for
sysctl support in Linux. You can use
sysctl to both read and
write sysctl data.
- variable
- The name of a key to read from. An example is kernel.ostype. The '/'
separator is also accepted in place of a '.'.
- variable=value
- To set a key, use the form variable=value where
variable is the key and value is the value to set it to. If
the value contains quotes or characters which are parsed by the shell, you
may need to enclose the value in double quotes.
- -n, --values
- Use this option to disable printing of the key name when printing
values.
- -e, --ignore
- Use this option to ignore errors about unknown keys.
- -N, --names
- Use this option to only print the names. It may be useful with shells that
have programmable completion.
- -q, --quiet
- Use this option to not display the values set to stdout.
- -w, --write
- Use this option when all arguments prescribe a key to be set.
- -p[FILE], --load[=FILE]
- Load in sysctl settings from the file specified or /etc/sysctl.conf if
none given. Specifying - as filename means reading data from standard
input. Using this option will mean arguments to sysctl are files,
which are read in the order they are specified. The file argument may be
specified as regular expression.
- -a, --all
- Display all values currently available.
- --deprecated
- Include deprecated parameters to --all values listing.
- -b, --binary
- Print value without new line.
- --system
- Load settings from all system configuration files. Files are read from
directories in the following list in given order from top to bottom. Once
a file of a given filename is loaded, any file of the same name in
subsequent directories is ignored.
/run/sysctl.d/*.conf
/etc/sysctl.d/*.conf
/usr/local/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf
/usr/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf
/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf
/etc/sysctl.conf
- -r, --pattern pattern
- Only apply settings that match pattern. The pattern uses
extended regular expression syntax.
- -A
- Alias of -a
- -d
- Alias of -h
- -f
- Alias of -p
- -X
- Alias of -a
- -o
- Does nothing, exists for BSD compatibility.
- -x
- Does nothing, exists for BSD compatibility.
- -h, --help
- Display help text and exit.
- -V, --version
- Display version information and exit.
/sbin/sysctl -a
/sbin/sysctl -n kernel.hostname
/sbin/sysctl -w kernel.domainname="example.com"
/sbin/sysctl -p/etc/sysctl.conf
/sbin/sysctl -a --pattern forward
/sbin/sysctl -a --pattern forward$
/sbin/sysctl -a --pattern 'net.ipv4.conf.(eth|wlan)0.arp'
/sbin/sysctl --system --pattern '^net.ipv6'
The
base_reachable_time and
retrans_time are deprecated. The
sysctl command does not allow changing values of these parameters. Users who
insist to use deprecated kernel interfaces should push values to /proc file
system by other means. For example:
echo 256 > /proc/sys/net/ipv6/neigh/eth0/base_reachable_time
/proc/sys
/etc/sysctl.conf
sysctl.conf(5) regex(7)
George Staikos
Please send bug reports to
procps@freelists.org