xref: /freebsd/usr.sbin/efivar/efivar.8 (revision 85732ac8)
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25.\" $FreeBSD$
26.\"
27.Dd May 22, 2017
28.Dt EFIVAR 8
29.Os
30.Sh NAME
31.Nm efivar
32.Nd UEFI environment variable interaction
33.Sh SYNOPSIS
34.Nm
35.Op Fl abdDHlLNpRtuw
36.Op Fl n Ar name
37.Op Fl f Ar file
38.Op Fl -append
39.Op Fl -ascii
40.Op Fl -attributes
41.Op Fl -binary
42.Op Fl -delete
43.Op Fl -device-path
44.Op Fl -fromfile Ar file
45.Op Fl -guid
46.Op Fl -hex
47.Op Fl -list-guids
48.Op Fl -list
49.Op Fl -name Ar name
50.Op Fl -no-name
51.Op Fl -print
52.Op Fl -print-decimal
53.Op Fl -raw-guid
54.Op Fl -utf8
55.Op Fl -write
56.Sh DESCRIPTION
57This program manages
58.Dq Unified Extensible Firmware Interface
59.Pq UEFI
60environment variables.
61UEFI variables have three part: A namespace, a name and a value.
62The namespace is a GUID that is self assigned by the group defining the
63variables.
64The name is a Unicode name for the variable.
65The value is binary data.
66All Unicode data is presented to the user as UTF-8.
67.Pp
68The following options are available:
69.Bl -tag -width 20m
70.It Fl n Ar name Fl -name Ar name
71Specify the name of the variable to operate on.
72The
73.Ar name
74argument is the GUID of the variable, followed by a dash, followed by the
75UEFI variable name.
76The GUID may be in numeric format, or may be one of the well known
77symbolic name (see
78.Fl -list-guids
79for a complete list).
80.It Fl f Ar file Fl -fromfile Ar file
81When writing or appending to a variable, take the data for the
82variable's value from
83.Ar file
84instead of from the command line.
85This flag implies
86.Fl -write
87unless the
88.Fl -append
89or
90.Fl -print
91flags are given.
92This behavior is not well understood and is currently unimplemented
93for writes.
94When
95.Fl -print
96is specified, the contents of the file are used as the value to
97print using any other specified flags.
98This is used primarily for testing purposes for more complicated
99variable decoding.
100.It Fl a Fl -append
101Append the specified value to the UEFI variable rather than replacing
102it.
103.It Fl t Ar attr Fl -attributes Ar attr
104Specify, in hexadecimal, the attributes for this
105variable.
106See section 7.2 (GetVariable subsection, Related Definitions) of the
107UEFI Specification for hex values to use.
108.It Fl A Fl -ascii
109Display the variable data as modified ascii: All printable characters
110are printed, while unprintable characters are rendered as a two-digit
111hexadecimal number preceded by a % character.
112.It Fl b Fl -binary
113Display the variable data as binary data.
114Usually will be used with the
115.Fl N
116or
117.Fl -no-name
118flag.
119Useful in scripts.
120.It Fl D Fl -delete
121Delete the specified variable.
122May not be used with either the
123.Fl -write
124or the
125.Fl -append
126flags.
127No
128.Ar value
129may be specified.
130.It Fl d Fl -device Fl -device-path
131Interpret the variables printed as UEFI device paths and print the
132UEFI standard string representation.
133.It Fl g Fl -guid
134flag is specified, guids are converted to names if they are known (and
135show up in
136.Fl -list-guids ).
137.It Fl H Fl -hex
138List variable data as a hex dump.
139.It Fl L Fl -list-guids
140Lists the well known GUIDs.
141The names listed here may be used in place of the numeric GUID values.
142These names will replace the numeric GUID values unless
143.Fl -raw-guid
144flag is specified.
145.It Fl l Fl -list
146List all the variables.
147If the
148.Fl -print
149flag is also listed, their values will be displayed.
150.It Fl N Fl -no-name
151Do not display the variable name.
152.It Fl p Fl -print
153Print the value of the variable.
154.It Fl R Fl -raw-guid
155Do not substitute well known names for GUID numeric values in output.
156.It Fl u Fl -utf8
157Treat the value of the variable as UCS2 and convert it to UTF8 and
158print the result.
159.It Fl w Fl -write
160Write (replace) the variable specified with the value specified from
161standard input.
162No command line option to do this is available since UEFI variables
163are binary structures rather than strings.
164.Xr echo 1
165.Fl n
166can be used to specify simple strings.
167.It Ar name
168Display the
169.Ar name
170environment variable.
171.El
172.Sh COMPATIBILITY
173The
174.Nm
175program is intended to be compatible (strict superset) with a program
176of the same name included in the Red Hat libefivar package,
177but the
178.Fl d
179and
180.Fl -print-decimal
181flags are not implemented and never will be.
182.Pp
183The
184.Fl d
185flag is short for
186.Fl -device-path .
187.Sh SEE ALSO
188Appendix A of the UEFI specification has the format for GUIDs.
189All GUIDs
190.Dq Globally Unique Identifiers
191have the format described in RFC 4122.
192.Sh HISTORY
193The
194.Nm
195utility first appeared in
196.Fx 11.1 .
197