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9 <productname>systemd</productname>
12 <contrib>Developer</contrib>
13 <firstname>Greg</firstname>
14 <surname>Kroah-Hartmann</surname>
15 <email>greg@kroah.com</email>
18 <contrib>Developer</contrib>
19 <firstname>Kay</firstname>
20 <surname>Sievers</surname>
21 <email>kay@vrfy.org</email>
27 <refentrytitle>udev</refentrytitle>
28 <manvolnum>7</manvolnum>
32 <refname>udev</refname>
33 <refpurpose>Dynamic device management</refpurpose>
36 <refsect1><title>Description</title>
37 <para>udev supplies the system software with device events, manages permissions
38 of device nodes and may create additional symlinks in the <filename>/dev</filename>
39 directory, or renames network interfaces. The kernel usually just assigns unpredictable
40 device names based on the order of discovery. Meaningful symlinks or network device
41 names provide a way to reliably identify devices based on their properties or
42 current configuration.</para>
44 <para>The udev daemon, <citerefentry><refentrytitle>systemd-udevd.service</refentrytitle>
45 <manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry>, receives device uevents directly from
46 the kernel whenever a device is added or removed from the system, or it changes its
47 state. When udev receives a device event, it matches its configured set of rules
48 against various device attributes to identify the device. Rules that match may
49 provide additional device information to be stored in the udev database or
50 to be used to create meaningful symlink names.</para>
52 <para>All device information udev processes is stored in the udev database and
53 sent out to possible event subscribers. Access to all stored data and the event
54 sources is provided by the library libudev.</para>
57 <refsect1><title>Rules Files</title>
58 <para>The udev rules are read from the files located in the
59 system rules directory <filename>/usr/lib/udev/rules.d</filename>,
60 the volatile runtime directory <filename>/run/udev/rules.d</filename>
61 and the local administration directory <filename>/etc/udev/rules.d</filename>.
62 All rules files are collectively sorted and processed in lexical order,
63 regardless of the directories in which they live. However, files with
64 identical filenames replace each other. Files in <filename>/etc</filename>
65 have the highest priority, files in <filename>/run</filename> take precedence
66 over files with the same name in <filename>/usr/lib</filename>. This can be
67 used to override a system-supplied rules file with a local file if needed;
68 a symlink in <filename>/etc</filename> with the same name as a rules file in
69 <filename>/usr/lib</filename>, pointing to <filename>/dev/null</filename>,
70 disables the rules file entirely. Rule files must have the extension
71 <filename>.rules</filename>; other extensions are ignored.</para>
73 <para>Every line in the rules file contains at least one key-value pair.
74 Except for empty lines or lines beginning with <literal>#</literal>, which are ignored.
75 There are two kinds of keys: match and assignment.
76 If all match keys match against their values, the rule gets applied and the
77 assignment keys get the specified values assigned.</para>
79 <para>A matching rule may rename a network interface, add symlinks
80 pointing to the device node, or run a specified program as part of
81 the event handling.</para>
83 <para>A rule consists of a comma-separated list of one or more key-value pairs.
84 Each key has a distinct operation, depending on the used operator. Valid
88 <term><literal>==</literal></term>
90 <para>Compare for equality.</para>
95 <term><literal>!=</literal></term>
97 <para>Compare for inequality.</para>
102 <term><literal>=</literal></term>
104 <para>Assign a value to a key. Keys that represent a list are reset
105 and only this single value is assigned.</para>
110 <term><literal>+=</literal></term>
112 <para>Add the value to a key that holds a list of entries.</para>
117 <term><literal>:=</literal></term>
119 <para>Assign a value to a key finally; disallow any later changes.</para>
124 <para>The following key names can be used to match against device properties.
125 Some of the keys also match against properties of the parent devices in sysfs,
126 not only the device that has generated the event. If multiple keys that match
127 a parent device are specified in a single rule, all these keys must match at
128 one and the same parent device.</para>
129 <variablelist class='udev-directives'>
131 <term><varname>ACTION</varname></term>
133 <para>Match the name of the event action.</para>
138 <term><varname>DEVPATH</varname></term>
140 <para>Match the devpath of the event device.</para>
145 <term><varname>KERNEL</varname></term>
147 <para>Match the name of the event device.</para>
152 <term><varname>NAME</varname></term>
154 <para>Match the name of a network interface. It can be used once the
155 NAME key has been set in one of the preceding rules.</para>
160 <term><varname>SYMLINK</varname></term>
162 <para>Match the name of a symlink targeting the node. It can
163 be used once a SYMLINK key has been set in one of the preceding
164 rules. There may be multiple symlinks; only one needs to match.
170 <term><varname>SUBSYSTEM</varname></term>
172 <para>Match the subsystem of the event device.</para>
176 <term><varname>DRIVER</varname></term>
178 <para>Match the driver name of the event device. Only set this key for devices
179 which are bound to a driver at the time the event is generated.</para>
183 <term><varname>ATTR{<replaceable>filename</replaceable>}</varname></term>
185 <para>Match sysfs attribute values of the event device. Trailing
186 whitespace in the attribute values is ignored unless the specified match
187 value itself contains trailing whitespace.
193 <term><varname>KERNELS</varname></term>
195 <para>Search the devpath upwards for a matching device name.</para>
200 <term><varname>SUBSYSTEMS</varname></term>
202 <para>Search the devpath upwards for a matching device subsystem name.</para>
207 <term><varname>DRIVERS</varname></term>
209 <para>Search the devpath upwards for a matching device driver name.</para>
214 <term><varname>ATTRS{<replaceable>filename</replaceable>}</varname></term>
216 <para>Search the devpath upwards for a device with matching sysfs attribute values.
217 If multiple <varname>ATTRS</varname> matches are specified, all of them
218 must match on the same device. Trailing whitespace in the attribute values is ignored
219 unless the specified match value itself contains trailing whitespace.</para>
224 <term><varname>TAGS</varname></term>
226 <para>Search the devpath upwards for a device with matching tag.</para>
231 <term><varname>ENV{<replaceable>key</replaceable>}</varname></term>
233 <para>Match against a device property value.</para>
238 <term><varname>TAG</varname></term>
240 <para>Match against a device tag.</para>
245 <term><varname>TEST{<replaceable>octal mode mask</replaceable>}</varname></term>
247 <para>Test the existence of a file. An octal mode mask can be specified
253 <term><varname>PROGRAM</varname></term>
255 <para>Execute a program to determine whether there
256 is a match; the key is true if the program returns
257 successfully. The device properties are made available to the
258 executed program in the environment. The program's standard ouput
259 is available in the <varname>RESULT</varname> key.</para>
260 <para>This can only be used for very short-running foreground tasks. For details,
261 see <varname>RUN</varname>.</para>
266 <term><varname>RESULT</varname></term>
268 <para>Match the returned string of the last <varname>PROGRAM</varname> call.
269 This key can be used in the same or in any later rule after a
270 <varname>PROGRAM</varname> call.</para>
275 <para>Most of the fields support shell glob pattern matching. The following
276 pattern characters are supported:</para>
279 <term><literal>*</literal></term>
281 <para>Matches zero or more characters.</para>
285 <term><literal>?</literal></term>
287 <para>Matches any single character.</para>
291 <term><literal>[]</literal></term>
293 <para>Matches any single character specified within the brackets. For
294 example, the pattern string <literal>tty[SR]</literal>
295 would match either <literal>ttyS</literal> or <literal>ttyR</literal>.
296 Ranges are also supported via the <literal>-</literal> character.
297 For example, to match on the range of all digits, the pattern
298 <literal>[0-9]</literal> could be used. If the first character
299 following the <literal>[</literal> is a <literal>!</literal>,
300 any characters not enclosed are matched.</para>
305 <para>The following keys can get values assigned:</para>
306 <variablelist class='udev-directives'>
308 <term><varname>NAME</varname></term>
310 <para>The name to use for a network interface. See
311 <citerefentry><refentrytitle>systemd.link</refentrytitle><manvolnum>5</manvolnum></citerefentry>
312 for a higher-level mechanism for setting the interface name.
313 The name of a device node cannot be changed by udev, only additional
314 symlinks can be created.</para>
319 <term><varname>SYMLINK</varname></term>
321 <para>The name of a symlink targeting the node. Every matching rule adds
322 this value to the list of symlinks to be created.</para>
323 <para>The set of characters to name a symlink is limited. Allowed
324 characters are <literal>0-9A-Za-z#+-.:=@_/</literal>, valid UTF-8 character
325 sequences, and <literal>\x00</literal> hex encoding. All other
326 characters are replaced by a <literal>_</literal> character.</para>
327 <para>Multiple symlinks may be specified by separating the names by the
328 space character. In case multiple devices claim the same name, the link
329 always points to the device with the highest link_priority. If the current
330 device goes away, the links are re-evaluated and the device with the
331 next highest link_priority becomes the owner of the link. If no
332 link_priority is specified, the order of the devices (and which one of
333 them owns the link) is undefined.</para>
334 <para>Symlink names must never conflict with the kernel's default device
335 node names, as that would result in unpredictable behavior.
341 <term><varname>OWNER</varname>, <varname>GROUP</varname>, <varname>MODE</varname></term>
343 <para>The permissions for the device node. Every specified value overrides
344 the compiled-in default value.</para>
349 <term><varname>SECLABEL{<replaceable>module</replaceable>}</varname></term>
351 <para>Applies the specified Linux Security Module label to the device node.</para>
356 <term><varname>ATTR{<replaceable>key</replaceable>}</varname></term>
358 <para>The value that should be written to a sysfs attribute of the
364 <term><varname>ENV{<replaceable>key</replaceable>}</varname></term>
366 <para>Set a device property value. Property names with a leading <literal>.</literal>
367 are neither stored in the database nor exported to events or
368 external tools (run by, for example, the <varname>PROGRAM</varname>
374 <term><varname>TAG</varname></term>
376 <para>Attach a tag to a device. This is used to filter events for users
377 of libudev's monitor functionality, or to enumerate a group of tagged
378 devices. The implementation can only work efficiently if only a few
379 tags are attached to a device. It is only meant to be used in
380 contexts with specific device filter requirements, and not as a
381 general-purpose flag. Excessive use might result in inefficient event
387 <term><varname>RUN{<replaceable>type</replaceable>}</varname></term>
389 <para>Add a program to the list of programs to be executed after
390 processing all the rules for a specific event, depending on
391 <literal>type</literal>:</para>
394 <term><literal>program</literal></term>
396 <para>Execute an external program specified as the assigned
397 value. If no absolute path is given, the program is expected
398 to live in <filename>/usr/lib/udev</filename>; otherwise, the
399 absolute path must be specified.</para>
400 <para>This is the default if no <replaceable>type</replaceable>
405 <term><literal>builtin</literal></term>
407 <para>As <varname>program</varname>, but use one of the
408 built-in programs rather than an external one.</para>
412 <para>The program name and following arguments are separated by spaces.
413 Single quotes can be used to specify arguments with spaces.</para>
414 <para>This can only be used for very short-running foreground tasks. Running an
415 event process for a long period of time may block all further events for
416 this or a dependent device.</para>
417 <para>Starting daemons or other long-running processes is not appropriate
418 for udev; the forked processes, detached or not, will be unconditionally
419 killed after the event handling has finished.</para>
424 <term><varname>LABEL</varname></term>
426 <para>A named label to which a <varname>GOTO</varname> may jump.</para>
431 <term><varname>GOTO</varname></term>
433 <para>Jumps to the next <varname>LABEL</varname> with a matching name.</para>
438 <term><varname>IMPORT{<replaceable>type</replaceable>}</varname></term>
440 <para>Import a set of variables as device properties,
441 depending on <literal>type</literal>:</para>
444 <term><literal>program</literal></term>
446 <para>Execute an external program specified as the assigned value and
447 import its output, which must be in environment key
448 format. Path specification, command/argument separation,
449 and quoting work like in <varname>RUN</varname>.</para>
453 <term><literal>builtin</literal></term>
455 <para>Similar to <literal>program</literal>, but use one of the
456 built-in programs rather than an external one.</para>
460 <term><literal>file</literal></term>
462 <para>Import a text file specified as the assigned value, the content
463 of which must be in environment key format.</para>
467 <term><literal>db</literal></term>
469 <para>Import a single property specified as the assigned value from the
470 current device database. This works only if the database is already populated
471 by an earlier event.</para>
475 <term><literal>cmdline</literal></term>
477 <para>Import a single property from the kernel command line. For simple flags
478 the value of the property is set to <literal>1</literal>.</para>
482 <term><literal>parent</literal></term>
484 <para>Import the stored keys from the parent device by reading
485 the database entry of the parent device. The value assigned to
486 <option>IMPORT{parent}</option> is used as a filter of key names
487 to import (with the same shell glob pattern matching used for
492 <para>This can only be used for very short-running foreground tasks. For details
493 see <option>RUN</option>.</para>
498 <term><varname>WAIT_FOR</varname></term>
500 <para>Wait for a file to become available or until a timeout of
501 10 seconds expires. The path is relative to the sysfs device;
502 if no path is specified, this waits for an attribute to appear.</para>
507 <term><varname>OPTIONS</varname></term>
509 <para>Rule and device options:</para>
510 <variablelist class='udev-directives'>
512 <term><option>link_priority=<replaceable>value</replaceable></option></term>
514 <para>Specify the priority of the created symlinks. Devices with higher
515 priorities overwrite existing symlinks of other devices. The default is 0.</para>
519 <term><option>event_timeout=</option></term>
521 <para>Number of seconds an event waits for operations to finish before
522 giving up and terminating itself.</para>
526 <term><option>string_escape=<replaceable>none|replace</replaceable></option></term>
528 <para>Usually control and other possibly unsafe characters are replaced
529 in strings used for device naming. The mode of replacement can be specified
530 with this option.</para>
534 <term><option>static_node=</option></term>
536 <para>Apply the permissions specified in this rule to the
537 static device node with the specified name. Also, for every
538 tag specified in this rule, create a symlink
540 <filename>/run/udev/static_node-tags/<replaceable>tag</replaceable></filename>
541 pointing at the static device node with the specified name.
542 Static device node creation is performed by systemd-tmpfiles
543 before systemd-udevd is started. The static nodes might not
544 have a corresponding kernel device; they are used to trigger
545 automatic kernel module loading when they are accessed.</para>
549 <term><option>watch</option></term>
551 <para>Watch the device node with inotify; when the node is
552 closed after being opened for writing, a change uevent is
557 <term><option>nowatch</option></term>
559 <para>Disable the watching of a device node with inotify.</para>
567 <para>The <varname>NAME</varname>, <varname>SYMLINK</varname>,
568 <varname>PROGRAM</varname>, <varname>OWNER</varname>,
569 <varname>GROUP</varname>, <varname>MODE</varname>, and
570 <varname>RUN</varname> fields support simple string substitutions.
571 The <varname>RUN</varname> substitutions are performed after all rules
572 have been processed, right before the program is executed, allowing for
573 the use of device properties set by earlier matching rules. For all other
574 fields, substitutions are performed while the individual rule is being
575 processed. The available substitutions are:</para>
576 <variablelist class='udev-directives'>
578 <term><option>$kernel</option>, <option>%k</option></term>
580 <para>The kernel name for this device.</para>
585 <term><option>$number</option>, <option>%n</option></term>
587 <para>The kernel number for this device. For example,
588 <literal>sda3</literal> has kernel number <literal>3</literal>.
594 <term><option>$devpath</option>, <option>%p</option></term>
596 <para>The devpath of the device.</para>
601 <term><option>$id</option>, <option>%b</option></term>
603 <para>The name of the device matched while searching the devpath
604 upwards for <option>SUBSYSTEMS</option>, <option>KERNELS</option>,
605 <option>DRIVERS</option>, and <option>ATTRS</option>.
611 <term><option>$driver</option></term>
613 <para>The driver name of the device matched while searching the
614 devpath upwards for <option>SUBSYSTEMS</option>,
615 <option>KERNELS</option>, <option>DRIVERS</option>, and
616 <option>ATTRS</option>.
622 <term><option>$attr{<replaceable>file</replaceable>}</option>, <option>%s{<replaceable>file</replaceable>}</option></term>
624 <para>The value of a sysfs attribute found at the device where
625 all keys of the rule have matched. If the matching device does not
626 have such an attribute, and a previous <option>KERNELS</option>,
627 <option>SUBSYSTEMS</option>, <option>DRIVERS</option>, or
628 <option>ATTRS</option> test selected a parent device, then the
629 attribute from that parent device is used.
631 <para>If the attribute is a symlink, the last element of the
632 symlink target is returned as the value.
638 <term><option>$env{<replaceable>key</replaceable>}</option>, <option>%E{<replaceable>key</replaceable>}</option></term>
640 <para>A device property value.</para>
645 <term><option>$major</option>, <option>%M</option></term>
647 <para>The kernel major number for the device.</para>
652 <term><option>$minor</option>, <option>%m</option></term>
654 <para>The kernel minor number for the device.</para>
659 <term><option>$result</option>, <option>%c</option></term>
661 <para>The string returned by the external program requested with
662 <varname>PROGRAM</varname>.
663 A single part of the string, separated by a space character, may be selected
664 by specifying the part number as an attribute: <literal>%c{N}</literal>.
665 If the number is followed by the <literal>+</literal> character, this part plus all remaining parts
666 of the result string are substituted: <literal>%c{N+}</literal>.</para>
671 <term><option>$parent</option>, <option>%P</option></term>
673 <para>The node name of the parent device.</para>
678 <term><option>$name</option></term>
680 <para>The current name of the device. If not changed by a rule, it is the
681 name of the kernel device.</para>
686 <term><option>$links</option></term>
688 <para>A space-separated list of the current symlinks. The value is
689 only set during a remove event or if an earlier rule assigned a value.</para>
694 <term><option>$root</option>, <option>%r</option></term>
696 <para>The udev_root value.</para>
701 <term><option>$sys</option>, <option>%S</option></term>
703 <para>The sysfs mount point.</para>
708 <term><option>$devnode</option>, <option>%N</option></term>
710 <para>The name of the device node.</para>
715 <term><option>%%</option></term>
717 <para>The <literal>%</literal> character itself.</para>
722 <term><option>$$</option></term>
724 <para>The <literal>$</literal> character itself.</para>
730 <refsect1><title>Hardware Database Files</title>
731 <para>The hwdb files are read from the files located in the
732 system hwdb directory <filename>/usr/lib/udev/hwdb.d</filename>,
733 the volatile runtime directory <filename>/run/udev/hwdb.d</filename>
734 and the local administration directory <filename>/etc/udev/hwdb.d</filename>.
735 All hwdb files are collectively sorted and processed in lexical order,
736 regardless of the directories in which they live. However, files with
737 identical filenames replace each other. Files in <filename>/etc</filename>
738 have the highest priority, files in <filename>/run</filename> take precedence
739 over files with the same name in <filename>/usr/lib</filename>. This can be
740 used to override a system-supplied hwdb file with a local file if needed;
741 a symlink in <filename>/etc</filename> with the same name as a hwdb file in
742 <filename>/usr/lib</filename>, pointing to <filename>/dev/null</filename>,
743 disables the hwdb file entirely. hwdb files must have the extension
744 <filename>.hwdb</filename>; other extensions are ignored.</para>
746 <para>The hwdb file contains data records consisting of matches and
747 associated key-value pairs. Every record in the hwdb starts with one or
748 more match string, specifying a shell glob to compare the database
749 lookup string against. Multiple match lines are specified in additional
750 consecutive lines. Every match line is compared indivdually, they are
751 combined by OR. Every match line must start at the first character of
754 <para>The match lines are followed by one or more key-value pair lines, which
755 are recognized by a leading space character. The key name and value are separated
756 by <literal>=</literal>. An empty line signifies the end
757 of a record. Lines beginning with <literal>#</literal> are ignored.</para>
759 <para>The content of all hwdb files is read by
760 <citerefentry><refentrytitle>udevadm</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry>
761 and compiled to a binary database located at <filename>/etc/udev/hwdb.bin</filename>.
762 During runtime only the binary database is used.</para>
766 <title>See Also</title>
769 <refentrytitle>systemd-udevd.service</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
772 <refentrytitle>udevadm</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
775 <refentrytitle>systemd.link</refentrytitle><manvolnum>5</manvolnum>