xref: /dragonfly/sbin/savecore/savecore.8 (revision c2cd059b)
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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 1.5 2006/03/25 16:18:24 swildner Exp $
35.\"
36.Dd September 23, 1994
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.Ar directory
51.Sh DESCRIPTION
52The
53.Nm
54utility
55copies the currently running kernel and its associated core dump into
56.Fa directory ,
57and enters a reboot message and information about the core dump into
58the system log.
59.Pp
60The options are as follows:
61.Bl -tag -width indent
62.It Fl c
63Clear the dump, so that future invocations of
64.Nm
65will ignore it.
66.It Fl f
67Force a dump to be taken even if the dump doesn't appear correct or there
68is insufficient disk space.
69.It Fl k
70Do not clear the dump after saving it.
71.It Fl N
72Use
73.Ar system
74as the kernel instead of the running kernel (as determined from
75.Xr getbootfile 3 ) .
76.It Fl P
77Specify physical memory size used at dumptime (cf. the
78.Va hw.physmem
79kernel environment variable).
80.It Fl B
81Specify offset of dump in blocks (as printed at dumptime).
82.It Fl v
83Print out some additional debugging information.
84.It Fl z
85Compress the core dump and kernel (see
86.Xr gzip 1 ) .
87.El
88.Pp
89The
90.Nm
91utility
92checks the core dump in various ways to make sure that it is current and
93that it corresponds to the currently running system.
94If it passes these checks, it saves the core image in
95.Ar directory Ns Pa /vmcore.#
96and the system in
97.Ar directory Ns Pa /kernel.#
98The ``#'' is the number from the first line of the file
99.Ar directory Ns Pa /bounds ,
100and it is incremented and stored back into the file each time
101.Nm
102successfully runs.
103.Pp
104The
105.Nm
106utility
107also checks the available disk space before attempting to make the copies.
108If there is insufficient disk space in the filesystem containing
109.Ar directory ,
110or if the file
111.Ar directory Ns Pa /minfree
112exists and the number of free kilobytes (for non-superusers) in the
113filesystem after the copies were made would be less than the number
114in the first line of this file, the copies are not attempted.
115.Pp
116If
117.Nm
118successfully copies the kernel and the core dump, the core dump is cleared
119so that future invocations of
120.Nm
121will ignore it.
122.Pp
123The
124.Nm
125utility
126is meant to be called near the end of the initialization file
127.Pa /etc/rc
128(see
129.Xr rc 8 ) .
130.Sh SEE ALSO
131.Xr gzip 1 ,
132.Xr getbootfile 3 ,
133.Xr dumpon 8 ,
134.Xr loader 8 ,
135.Xr syslogd 8
136.Sh HISTORY
137The
138.Nm
139utility appeared in
140.Bx 4.1 .
141.Sh BUGS
142The minfree code does not consider the effect of compression.
143