]> git.proxmox.com Git - mirror_ubuntu-artful-kernel.git/blame - Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.rst
powerpc/powernv: Add support to set power-shifting-ratio
[mirror_ubuntu-artful-kernel.git] / Documentation / admin-guide / kernel-parameters.rst
CommitLineData
9b9355a2
AC
1.. _kernelparameters:
2
7358bb2f
JC
3The kernel's command-line parameters
4====================================
1da177e4 5
5888bcc5
RR
6The following is a consolidated list of the kernel parameters as
7implemented by the __setup(), core_param() and module_param() macros
8and sorted into English Dictionary order (defined as ignoring all
9punctuation and sorting digits before letters in a case insensitive
10manner), and with descriptions where known.
11
12The kernel parses parameters from the kernel command line up to "--";
13if it doesn't recognize a parameter and it doesn't contain a '.', the
14parameter gets passed to init: parameters with '=' go into init's
15environment, others are passed as command line arguments to init.
16Everything after "--" is passed as an argument to init.
17
18Module parameters can be specified in two ways: via the kernel command
684adc0a 19line with a module name prefix, or via modprobe, e.g.::
5888bcc5
RR
20
21 (kernel command line) usbcore.blinkenlights=1
22 (modprobe command line) modprobe usbcore blinkenlights=1
23
24Parameters for modules which are built into the kernel need to be
25specified on the kernel command line. modprobe looks through the
26kernel command line (/proc/cmdline) and collects module parameters
27when it loads a module, so the kernel command line can be used for
28loadable modules too.
1da177e4 29
684adc0a
MCC
30Hyphens (dashes) and underscores are equivalent in parameter names, so::
31
ca1eda2d 32 log_buf_len=1M print-fatal-signals=1
684adc0a
MCC
33
34can also be entered as::
35
ca1eda2d
RD
36 log-buf-len=1M print_fatal_signals=1
37
684adc0a
MCC
38Double-quotes can be used to protect spaces in values, e.g.::
39
5888bcc5 40 param="spaces in here"
ca1eda2d 41
2d13e6ca
NC
42cpu lists:
43----------
44
45Some kernel parameters take a list of CPUs as a value, e.g. isolcpus,
46nohz_full, irqaffinity, rcu_nocbs. The format of this list is:
47
48 <cpu number>,...,<cpu number>
49
50or
51
52 <cpu number>-<cpu number>
53 (must be a positive range in ascending order)
54
55or a mixture
56
57<cpu number>,...,<cpu number>-<cpu number>
58
59Note that for the special case of a range one can split the range into equal
60sized groups and for each group use some amount from the beginning of that
61group:
62
63 <cpu number>-cpu number>:<used size>/<group size>
64
65For example one can add to the command line following parameter:
66
67 isolcpus=1,2,10-20,100-2000:2/25
68
69where the final item represents CPUs 100,101,125,126,150,151,...
70
71
72
a901ebb9
SR
73This document may not be entirely up to date and comprehensive. The command
74"modinfo -p ${modulename}" shows a current list of all parameters of a loadable
75module. Loadable modules, after being loaded into the running kernel, also
76reveal their parameters in /sys/module/${modulename}/parameters/. Some of these
77parameters may be changed at runtime by the command
684adc0a 78``echo -n ${value} > /sys/module/${modulename}/parameters/${parm}``.
a901ebb9 79
6585fa8a
SR
80The parameters listed below are only valid if certain kernel build options were
81enabled and if respective hardware is present. The text in square brackets at
82the beginning of each description states the restrictions within which a
684adc0a 83parameter is applicable::
1da177e4
LT
84
85 ACPI ACPI support is enabled.
c99c108a 86 AGP AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port) is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
87 ALSA ALSA sound support is enabled.
88 APIC APIC support is enabled.
89 APM Advanced Power Management support is enabled.
16290246 90 ARM ARM architecture is enabled.
1da177e4 91 AX25 Appropriate AX.25 support is enabled.
0ae53640 92 BLACKFIN Blackfin architecture is enabled.
1e435256 93 CLK Common clock infrastructure is enabled.
5c71d618 94 CMA Contiguous Memory Area support is enabled.
9cfe268e
AC
95 DRM Direct Rendering Management support is enabled.
96 DYNAMIC_DEBUG Build in debug messages and enable them at runtime
1da177e4
LT
97 EDD BIOS Enhanced Disk Drive Services (EDD) is enabled
98 EFI EFI Partitioning (GPT) is enabled
99 EIDE EIDE/ATAPI support is enabled.
7102ebcd 100 EVM Extended Verification Module
1da177e4 101 FB The frame buffer device is enabled.
16290246 102 FTRACE Function tracing enabled.
2521f2c2 103 GCOV GCOV profiling is enabled.
1da177e4 104 HW Appropriate hardware is enabled.
1da177e4 105 IA-64 IA-64 architecture is enabled.
6146f0d5 106 IMA Integrity measurement architecture is enabled.
1da177e4 107 IOSCHED More than one I/O scheduler is enabled.
41e2e8be 108 IP_PNP IP DHCP, BOOTP, or RARP is enabled.
b0f83b28 109 IPV6 IPv6 support is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
110 ISAPNP ISA PnP code is enabled.
111 ISDN Appropriate ISDN support is enabled.
112 JOY Appropriate joystick support is enabled.
84c08fd6 113 KGDB Kernel debugger support is enabled.
fef07aae 114 KVM Kernel Virtual Machine support is enabled.
11ef697b 115 LIBATA Libata driver is enabled
1da177e4
LT
116 LP Printer support is enabled.
117 LOOP Loopback device support is enabled.
118 M68k M68k architecture is enabled.
119 These options have more detailed description inside of
120 Documentation/m68k/kernel-options.txt.
1da177e4 121 MDA MDA console support is enabled.
16290246 122 MIPS MIPS architecture is enabled.
1da177e4 123 MOUSE Appropriate mouse support is enabled.
309e57df 124 MSI Message Signaled Interrupts (PCI).
c8facbb6 125 MTD MTD (Memory Technology Device) support is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
126 NET Appropriate network support is enabled.
127 NUMA NUMA support is enabled.
128 NFS Appropriate NFS support is enabled.
129 OSS OSS sound support is enabled.
c8facbb6
RD
130 PV_OPS A paravirtualized kernel is enabled.
131 PARIDE The ParIDE (parallel port IDE) subsystem is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
132 PARISC The PA-RISC architecture is enabled.
133 PCI PCI bus support is enabled.
7f785763 134 PCIE PCI Express support is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
135 PCMCIA The PCMCIA subsystem is enabled.
136 PNP Plug & Play support is enabled.
137 PPC PowerPC architecture is enabled.
138 PPT Parallel port support is enabled.
139 PS2 Appropriate PS/2 support is enabled.
140 RAM RAM disk support is enabled.
141 S390 S390 architecture is enabled.
142 SCSI Appropriate SCSI support is enabled.
163475fb
RD
143 A lot of drivers have their options described inside
144 the Documentation/scsi/ sub-directory.
20510f2f 145 SECURITY Different security models are enabled.
1da177e4 146 SELINUX SELinux support is enabled.
c1c124e9 147 APPARMOR AppArmor support is enabled.
1da177e4 148 SERIAL Serial support is enabled.
e523d93c 149 SH SuperH architecture is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
150 SMP The kernel is an SMP kernel.
151 SPARC Sparc architecture is enabled.
77437fd4
DB
152 SWSUSP Software suspend (hibernation) is enabled.
153 SUSPEND System suspend states are enabled.
225a9be2 154 TPM TPM drivers are enabled.
1da177e4 155 TS Appropriate touchscreen support is enabled.
d4f373e5 156 UMS USB Mass Storage support is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
157 USB USB support is enabled.
158 USBHID USB Human Interface Device support is enabled.
159 V4L Video For Linux support is enabled.
81a054ce 160 VMMIO Driver for memory mapped virtio devices is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
161 VGA The VGA console has been enabled.
162 VT Virtual terminal support is enabled.
163 WDT Watchdog support is enabled.
164 XT IBM PC/XT MFM hard disk support is enabled.
cd4f0ef7 165 X86-32 X86-32, aka i386 architecture is enabled.
1da177e4
LT
166 X86-64 X86-64 architecture is enabled.
167 More X86-64 boot options can be found in
71cced6e 168 Documentation/x86/x86_64/boot-options.txt .
16290246 169 X86 Either 32-bit or 64-bit x86 (same as X86-32+X86-64)
1c532e00 170 X86_UV SGI UV support is enabled.
c1c5413a 171 XEN Xen support is enabled
1da177e4 172
684adc0a 173In addition, the following text indicates that the option::
1da177e4
LT
174
175 BUGS= Relates to possible processor bugs on the said processor.
176 KNL Is a kernel start-up parameter.
177 BOOT Is a boot loader parameter.
178
179Parameters denoted with BOOT are actually interpreted by the boot
180loader, and have no meaning to the kernel directly.
181Do not modify the syntax of boot loader parameters without extreme
954a8b81 182need or coordination with <Documentation/x86/boot.txt>.
1da177e4 183
5558870b 184There are also arch-specific kernel-parameters not documented here.
71cced6e 185See for example <Documentation/x86/x86_64/boot-options.txt>.
5558870b 186
1da177e4
LT
187Note that ALL kernel parameters listed below are CASE SENSITIVE, and that
188a trailing = on the name of any parameter states that that parameter will
189be entered as an environment variable, whereas its absence indicates that
190it will appear as a kernel argument readable via /proc/cmdline by programs
191running once the system is up.
192
9c4751fd 193The number of kernel parameters is not limited, but the length of the
194complete command line (parameters including spaces etc.) is limited to
195a fixed number of characters. This limit depends on the architecture
196and is between 256 and 4096 characters. It is defined in the file
197./include/asm/setup.h as COMMAND_LINE_SIZE.
198
7a19a237
AD
199Finally, the [KMG] suffix is commonly described after a number of kernel
200parameter values. These 'K', 'M', and 'G' letters represent the _binary_
9f02a486 201multipliers 'Kilo', 'Mega', and 'Giga', equaling 2^10, 2^20, and 2^30
e52347bd 202bytes respectively. Such letter suffixes can also be entirely omitted:
7a19a237 203
e52347bd
JN
204.. include:: kernel-parameters.txt
205 :literal:
1da177e4 206
684adc0a
MCC
207Todo
208----
1da177e4 209
1da177e4 210 Add more DRM drivers.