xref: /dragonfly/sbin/savecore/savecore.8 (revision 0cfebe3d)
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32.\"     From: @(#)savecore.8	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/5/93
33.\" $FreeBSD: src/sbin/savecore/savecore.8,v 1.8.2.6 2002/06/20 23:09:09 charnier Exp $
34.\" $DragonFly: src/sbin/savecore/savecore.8,v 1.7 2006/10/20 18:30:12 corecode Exp $
35.\"
36.Dd October 20, 2006
37.Dt SAVECORE 8
38.Os
39.Sh NAME
40.Nm savecore
41.Nd "save a core dump of the operating system"
42.Sh SYNOPSIS
43.Nm
44.Fl c
45.Nm
46.Op Fl fkvz
47.Op Fl N Ar system
48.Op Fl P Ar physmem
49.Op Fl B Ar blkno
50.Op Fl D Ar device
51.Ar directory
52.Sh DESCRIPTION
53The
54.Nm
55utility
56copies the currently running kernel and its associated core dump into
57.Fa directory ,
58and enters a reboot message and information about the core dump into
59the system log.
60.Pp
61The options are as follows:
62.Bl -tag -width indent
63.It Fl c
64Clear the dump, so that future invocations of
65.Nm
66will ignore it.
67.It Fl f
68Force a dump to be taken even if the dump doesn't appear correct or there
69is insufficient disk space.
70.It Fl k
71Do not clear the dump after saving it.
72.It Fl N
73Use
74.Ar system
75as the kernel instead of the running kernel (as determined from
76.Xr getbootfile 3 ) .
77.It Fl P
78Specify physical memory size used at dumptime (cf. the
79.Va hw.physmem
80kernel environment variable).
81.It Fl B
82Specify offset of dump in blocks (as printed at dumptime).
83.It Fl D
84Specify an alternative device to obtain the dump from.
85Unless your current
86.Va dumpdev
87and
88.Ar device
89have the same size, you will need to specify
90the block offset of the dump with
91.Fl B .
92.It Fl v
93Print out some additional debugging information.
94.It Fl z
95Compress the core dump and kernel (see
96.Xr gzip 1 ) .
97.El
98.Pp
99The
100.Nm
101utility
102checks the core dump in various ways to make sure that it is current and
103that it corresponds to the currently running system.
104If it passes these checks, it saves the core image in
105.Ar directory Ns Pa /vmcore.#
106and the system in
107.Ar directory Ns Pa /kernel.#
108The ``#'' is the number from the first line of the file
109.Ar directory Ns Pa /bounds ,
110and it is incremented and stored back into the file each time
111.Nm
112successfully runs.
113.Pp
114The
115.Nm
116utility
117also checks the available disk space before attempting to make the copies.
118If there is insufficient disk space in the filesystem containing
119.Ar directory ,
120or if the file
121.Ar directory Ns Pa /minfree
122exists and the number of free kilobytes (for non-superusers) in the
123filesystem after the copies were made would be less than the number
124in the first line of this file, the copies are not attempted.
125.Pp
126If
127.Nm
128successfully copies the kernel and the core dump, the core dump is cleared
129so that future invocations of
130.Nm
131will ignore it.
132.Pp
133The
134.Nm
135utility
136is meant to be called near the end of the initialization file
137.Pa /etc/rc
138(see
139.Xr rc 8 ) .
140.Sh SEE ALSO
141.Xr gzip 1 ,
142.Xr getbootfile 3 ,
143.Xr dumpon 8 ,
144.Xr loader 8 ,
145.Xr syslogd 8
146.Sh HISTORY
147The
148.Nm
149utility appeared in
150.Bx 4.1 .
151.Sh BUGS
152The minfree code does not consider the effect of compression.
153