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1da177e4 LT |
1 | Documentation for /proc/sys/ kernel version 2.2.10 |
2 | (c) 1998, 1999, Rik van Riel <riel@nl.linux.org> | |
3 | ||
4 | 'Why', I hear you ask, 'would anyone even _want_ documentation | |
5 | for them sysctl files? If anybody really needs it, it's all in | |
6 | the source...' | |
7 | ||
8 | Well, this documentation is written because some people either | |
9 | don't know they need to tweak something, or because they don't | |
10 | have the time or knowledge to read the source code. | |
11 | ||
12 | Furthermore, the programmers who built sysctl have built it to | |
13 | be actually used, not just for the fun of programming it :-) | |
14 | ||
15 | ============================================================== | |
16 | ||
17 | Legal blurb: | |
18 | ||
19 | As usual, there are two main things to consider: | |
20 | 1. you get what you pay for | |
21 | 2. it's free | |
22 | ||
23 | The consequences are that I won't guarantee the correctness of | |
24 | this document, and if you come to me complaining about how you | |
25 | screwed up your system because of wrong documentation, I won't | |
26 | feel sorry for you. I might even laugh at you... | |
27 | ||
28 | But of course, if you _do_ manage to screw up your system using | |
29 | only the sysctl options used in this file, I'd like to hear of | |
30 | it. Not only to have a great laugh, but also to make sure that | |
31 | you're the last RTFMing person to screw up. | |
32 | ||
33 | In short, e-mail your suggestions, corrections and / or horror | |
34 | stories to: <riel@nl.linux.org> | |
35 | ||
36 | Rik van Riel. | |
37 | ||
38 | ============================================================== | |
39 | ||
40 | Introduction: | |
41 | ||
42 | Sysctl is a means of configuring certain aspects of the kernel | |
43 | at run-time, and the /proc/sys/ directory is there so that you | |
44 | don't even need special tools to do it! | |
45 | In fact, there are only four things needed to use these config | |
46 | facilities: | |
47 | - a running Linux system | |
48 | - root access | |
49 | - common sense (this is especially hard to come by these days) | |
50 | - knowledge of what all those values mean | |
51 | ||
52 | As a quick 'ls /proc/sys' will show, the directory consists of | |
53 | several (arch-dependent?) subdirs. Each subdir is mainly about | |
54 | one part of the kernel, so you can do configuration on a piece | |
55 | by piece basis, or just some 'thematic frobbing'. | |
56 | ||
57 | The subdirs are about: | |
58 | abi/ execution domains & personalities | |
59 | debug/ <empty> | |
60 | dev/ device specific information (eg dev/cdrom/info) | |
61 | fs/ specific filesystems | |
62 | filehandle, inode, dentry and quota tuning | |
63 | binfmt_misc <Documentation/binfmt_misc.txt> | |
64 | kernel/ global kernel info / tuning | |
65 | miscellaneous stuff | |
66 | net/ networking stuff, for documentation look in: | |
67 | <Documentation/networking/> | |
68 | proc/ <empty> | |
69 | sunrpc/ SUN Remote Procedure Call (NFS) | |
70 | vm/ memory management tuning | |
71 | buffer and cache management | |
72 | ||
73 | These are the subdirs I have on my system. There might be more | |
74 | or other subdirs in another setup. If you see another dir, I'd | |
75 | really like to hear about it :-) |