NAME    [Toc]    [Back]

     dmesg -- display the system message buffer

SYNOPSIS    [Toc]    [Back]

     dmesg [-a] [-M core] [-N system]

DESCRIPTION    [Toc]    [Back]

     The dmesg utility displays the contents of the system message buffer.  If
     neither the -N nor the -M option is specified, the buffer is read from
     the currently running kernel via the sysctl(3) interface.	Otherwise, the
     buffer is read from the specified core file (or from the default one),
     using the name list from the specified kernel image (or from the default
     image).

     The options are as follows:

     -a      Show all data in the message buffer.  This includes any syslog
	     records and /dev/console output.

     -M      Extract values associated with the name list from the specified
	     core instead of the default /dev/kmem.

     -N      Extract the name list from the specified system instead of the
	     default, which is the kernel image the system has booted from.

FILES    [Toc]    [Back]

     /var/run/dmesg.boot  usually a snapshot of the buffer contents taken soon
			  after file systems are mounted at startup time

SEE ALSO    [Toc]    [Back]

     sysctl(3), syslogd(8)

HISTORY    [Toc]    [Back]

     The dmesg utility appeared in 4.0BSD.


FreeBSD 5.2.1			 June 5, 1993			 FreeBSD 5.2.1