Provided by: systemd_237-3ubuntu10.57_amd64 bug

NAME

       journalctl - Query the systemd journal

SYNOPSIS

       journalctl [OPTIONS...] [MATCHES...]

DESCRIPTION

       journalctl may be used to query the contents of the systemd(1) journal as written by
       systemd-journald.service(8).

       If called without parameters, it will show the full contents of the journal, starting with
       the oldest entry collected.

       If one or more match arguments are passed, the output is filtered accordingly. A match is
       in the format "FIELD=VALUE", e.g.  "_SYSTEMD_UNIT=httpd.service", referring to the
       components of a structured journal entry. See systemd.journal-fields(7) for a list of
       well-known fields. If multiple matches are specified matching different fields, the log
       entries are filtered by both, i.e. the resulting output will show only entries matching
       all the specified matches of this kind. If two matches apply to the same field, then they
       are automatically matched as alternatives, i.e. the resulting output will show entries
       matching any of the specified matches for the same field. Finally, the character "+" may
       appear as a separate word between other terms on the command line. This causes all matches
       before and after to be combined in a disjunction (i.e. logical OR).

       It is also possible to filter the entries by specifying an absolute file path as an
       argument. The file path may be a file or a symbolic link and the file must exist at the
       time of the query. If a file path refers to an executable binary, an "_EXE=" match for the
       canonicalized binary path is added to the query. If a file path refers to an executable
       script, a "_COMM=" match for the script name is added to the query. If a file path refers
       to a device node, "_KERNEL_DEVICE=" matches for the kernel name of the device and for each
       of its ancestor devices is added to the query. Symbolic links are dereferenced, kernel
       names are synthesized, and parent devices are identified from the environment at the time
       of the query. In general, a device node is the best proxy for an actual device, as log
       entries do not usually contain fields that identify an actual device. For the resulting
       log entries to be correct for the actual device, the relevant parts of the environment at
       the time the entry was logged, in particular the actual device corresponding to the device
       node, must have been the same as those at the time of the query. Because device nodes
       generally change their corresponding devices across reboots, specifying a device node path
       causes the resulting entries to be restricted to those from the current boot.

       Additional constraints may be added using options --boot, --unit=, etc., to further limit
       what entries will be shown (logical AND).

       Output is interleaved from all accessible journal files, whether they are rotated or
       currently being written, and regardless of whether they belong to the system itself or are
       accessible user journals.

       The set of journal files which will be used can be modified using the --user, --system,
       --directory, and --file options, see below.

       All users are granted access to their private per-user journals. However, by default, only
       root and users who are members of a few special groups are granted access to the system
       journal and the journals of other users. Members of the groups "systemd-journal", "adm",
       and "wheel" can read all journal files. Note that the two latter groups traditionally have
       additional privileges specified by the distribution. Members of the "wheel" group can
       often perform administrative tasks.

       The output is paged through less by default, and long lines are "truncated" to screen
       width. The hidden part can be viewed by using the left-arrow and right-arrow keys. Paging
       can be disabled; see the --no-pager option and the "Environment" section below.

       When outputting to a tty, lines are colored according to priority: lines of level ERROR
       and higher are colored red; lines of level NOTICE and higher are highlighted; other lines
       are displayed normally.

OPTIONS

       The following options are understood:

       --no-full, --full, -l
           Ellipsize fields when they do not fit in available columns. The default is to show
           full fields, allowing them to wrap or be truncated by the pager, if one is used.

           The old options -l/--full are not useful anymore, except to undo --no-full.

       -a, --all
           Show all fields in full, even if they include unprintable characters or are very long.

       -f, --follow
           Show only the most recent journal entries, and continuously print new entries as they
           are appended to the journal.

       -e, --pager-end
           Immediately jump to the end of the journal inside the implied pager tool. This implies
           -n1000 to guarantee that the pager will not buffer logs of unbounded size. This may be
           overridden with an explicit -n with some other numeric value, while -nall will disable
           this cap. Note that this option is only supported for the less(1) pager.

       -n, --lines=
           Show the most recent journal events and limit the number of events shown. If --follow
           is used, this option is implied. The argument is a positive integer or "all" to
           disable line limiting. The default value is 10 if no argument is given.

       --no-tail
           Show all stored output lines, even in follow mode. Undoes the effect of --lines=.

       -r, --reverse
           Reverse output so that the newest entries are displayed first.

       -o, --output=
           Controls the formatting of the journal entries that are shown. Takes one of the
           following options:

           short
               is the default and generates an output that is mostly identical to the formatting
               of classic syslog files, showing one line per journal entry.

           short-full
               is very similar, but shows timestamps in the format the --since= and --until=
               options accept. Unlike the timestamp information shown in short output mode this
               mode includes weekday, year and timezone information in the output, and is
               locale-independent.

           short-iso
               is very similar, but shows ISO 8601 wallclock timestamps.

           short-iso-precise
               as for short-iso but includes full microsecond precision.

           short-precise
               is very similar, but shows classic syslog timestamps with full microsecond
               precision.

           short-monotonic
               is very similar, but shows monotonic timestamps instead of wallclock timestamps.

           short-unix
               is very similar, but shows seconds passed since January 1st 1970 UTC instead of
               wallclock timestamps ("UNIX time"). The time is shown with microsecond accuracy.

           verbose
               shows the full-structured entry items with all fields.

           export
               serializes the journal into a binary (but mostly text-based) stream suitable for
               backups and network transfer (see Journal Export Format[1] for more information).
               To import the binary stream back into native journald format use systemd-journal-
               remote(8).

           json
               formats entries as JSON data structures, one per line (see Journal JSON Format[2]
               for more information).

           json-pretty
               formats entries as JSON data structures, but formats them in multiple lines in
               order to make them more readable by humans.

           json-sse
               formats entries as JSON data structures, but wraps them in a format suitable for
               Server-Sent Events[3].

           cat
               generates a very terse output, only showing the actual message of each journal
               entry with no metadata, not even a timestamp.

       --output-fields=
           A comma separated list of the fields which should be included in the output. This only
           has an effect for the output modes which would normally show all fields (verbose,
           export, json, json-pretty, and json-sse). The "__CURSOR", "__REALTIME_TIMESTAMP",
           "__MONOTONIC_TIMESTAMP", and "_BOOT_ID" fields are always printed.

       --utc
           Express time in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

       --no-hostname
           Don't show the hostname field of log messages originating from the local host. This
           switch only has an effect on the short family of output modes (see above).

       -x, --catalog
           Augment log lines with explanation texts from the message catalog. This will add
           explanatory help texts to log messages in the output where this is available. These
           short help texts will explain the context of an error or log event, possible
           solutions, as well as pointers to support forums, developer documentation, and any
           other relevant manuals. Note that help texts are not available for all messages, but
           only for selected ones. For more information on the message catalog, please refer to
           the Message Catalog Developer Documentation[4].

           Note: when attaching journalctl output to bug reports, please do not use -x.

       -q, --quiet
           Suppresses all informational messages (i.e. "-- Logs begin at ...", "-- Reboot --"),
           any warning messages regarding inaccessible system journals when run as a normal user.

       -m, --merge
           Show entries interleaved from all available journals, including remote ones.

       -b [ID][±offset], --boot=[ID][±offset]
           Show messages from a specific boot. This will add a match for "_BOOT_ID=".

           The argument may be empty, in which case logs for the current boot will be shown.

           If the boot ID is omitted, a positive offset will look up the boots starting from the
           beginning of the journal, and an equal-or-less-than zero offset will look up boots
           starting from the end of the journal. Thus, 1 means the first boot found in the
           journal in chronological order, 2 the second and so on; while -0 is the last boot, -1
           the boot before last, and so on. An empty offset is equivalent to specifying -0,
           except when the current boot is not the last boot (e.g. because --directory was
           specified to look at logs from a different machine).

           If the 32-character ID is specified, it may optionally be followed by offset which
           identifies the boot relative to the one given by boot ID. Negative values mean earlier
           boots and positive values mean later boots. If offset is not specified, a value of
           zero is assumed, and the logs for the boot given by ID are shown.

       --list-boots
           Show a tabular list of boot numbers (relative to the current boot), their IDs, and the
           timestamps of the first and last message pertaining to the boot.

       -k, --dmesg
           Show only kernel messages. This implies -b and adds the match "_TRANSPORT=kernel".

       -t, --identifier=SYSLOG_IDENTIFIER
           Show messages for the specified syslog identifier SYSLOG_IDENTIFIER.

           This parameter can be specified multiple times.

       -u, --unit=UNIT|PATTERN
           Show messages for the specified systemd unit UNIT (such as a service unit), or for any
           of the units matched by PATTERN. If a pattern is specified, a list of unit names found
           in the journal is compared with the specified pattern and all that match are used. For
           each unit name, a match is added for messages from the unit ("_SYSTEMD_UNIT=UNIT"),
           along with additional matches for messages from systemd and messages about coredumps
           for the specified unit.

           This parameter can be specified multiple times.

       --user-unit=
           Show messages for the specified user session unit. This will add a match for messages
           from the unit ("_SYSTEMD_USER_UNIT=" and "_UID=") and additional matches for messages
           from session systemd and messages about coredumps for the specified unit.

           This parameter can be specified multiple times.

       -p, --priority=
           Filter output by message priorities or priority ranges. Takes either a single numeric
           or textual log level (i.e. between 0/"emerg" and 7/"debug"), or a range of
           numeric/text log levels in the form FROM..TO. The log levels are the usual syslog log
           levels as documented in syslog(3), i.e.  "emerg" (0), "alert" (1), "crit" (2),
           "err" (3), "warning" (4), "notice" (5), "info" (6), "debug" (7). If a single log level
           is specified, all messages with this log level or a lower (hence more important) log
           level are shown. If a range is specified, all messages within the range are shown,
           including both the start and the end value of the range. This will add "PRIORITY="
           matches for the specified priorities.

       -g, --grep=
           Filter output to entries where the MESSAGE= field matches the specified regular
           expression. PERL-compatible regular expressions are used, see pcre2pattern(3) for a
           detailed description of the syntax.

           If the pattern is all lowercase, matching is case insensitive. Otherwise, matching is
           case sensitive. This can be overridden with the --case-sensitive option, see below.

       --case-sensitive[=BOOLEAN]
           Make pattern matching case sensitive or case insenstive.

       -c, --cursor=
           Start showing entries from the location in the journal specified by the passed cursor.

       --after-cursor=
           Start showing entries from the location in the journal after the location specified by
           the passed cursor. The cursor is shown when the --show-cursor option is used.

       --show-cursor
           The cursor is shown after the last entry after two dashes:

               -- cursor: s=0639...

           The format of the cursor is private and subject to change.

       -S, --since=, -U, --until=
           Start showing entries on or newer than the specified date, or on or older than the
           specified date, respectively. Date specifications should be of the format "2012-10-30
           18:17:16". If the time part is omitted, "00:00:00" is assumed. If only the seconds
           component is omitted, ":00" is assumed. If the date component is omitted, the current
           day is assumed. Alternatively the strings "yesterday", "today", "tomorrow" are
           understood, which refer to 00:00:00 of the day before the current day, the current
           day, or the day after the current day, respectively.  "now" refers to the current
           time. Finally, relative times may be specified, prefixed with "-" or "+", referring to
           times before or after the current time, respectively. For complete time and date
           specification, see systemd.time(7). Note that --output=short-full prints timestamps
           that follow precisely this format.

       -F, --field=
           Print all possible data values the specified field can take in all entries of the
           journal.

       -N, --fields
           Print all field names currently used in all entries of the journal.

       --system, --user
           Show messages from system services and the kernel (with --system). Show messages from
           service of current user (with --user). If neither is specified, show all messages that
           the user can see.

       -M, --machine=
           Show messages from a running, local container. Specify a container name to connect to.

       -D DIR, --directory=DIR
           Takes a directory path as argument. If specified, journalctl will operate on the
           specified journal directory DIR instead of the default runtime and system journal
           paths.

       --file=GLOB
           Takes a file glob as an argument. If specified, journalctl will operate on the
           specified journal files matching GLOB instead of the default runtime and system
           journal paths. May be specified multiple times, in which case files will be suitably
           interleaved.

       --root=ROOT
           Takes a directory path as an argument. If specified, journalctl will operate on
           journal directories and catalog file hierarchy underneath the specified directory
           instead of the root directory (e.g.  --update-catalog will create
           ROOT/var/lib/systemd/catalog/database, and journal files under ROOT/run/journal or
           ROOT/var/log/journal will be displayed).

       --new-id128
           Instead of showing journal contents, generate a new 128-bit ID suitable for
           identifying messages. This is intended for usage by developers who need a new
           identifier for a new message they introduce and want to make recognizable. This will
           print the new ID in four different formats which can be copied into source code or
           similar.

       --header
           Instead of showing journal contents, show internal header information of the journal
           fields accessed.

       --disk-usage
           Shows the current disk usage of all journal files. This shows the sum of the disk
           usage of all archived and active journal files.

       --vacuum-size=, --vacuum-time=, --vacuum-files=
           Removes archived journal files until the disk space they use falls below the specified
           size (specified with the usual "K", "M", "G" and "T" suffixes), or all archived
           journal files contain no data older than the specified timespan (specified with the
           usual "s", "m", "h", "days", "months", "weeks" and "years" suffixes), or no more than
           the specified number of separate journal files remain. Note that running
           --vacuum-size= has only an indirect effect on the output shown by --disk-usage, as the
           latter includes active journal files, while the vacuuming operation only operates on
           archived journal files. Similarly, --vacuum-files= might not actually reduce the
           number of journal files to below the specified number, as it will not remove active
           journal files.  --vacuum-size=, --vacuum-time= and --vacuum-files= may be combined in
           a single invocation to enforce any combination of a size, a time and a number of files
           limit on the archived journal files. Specifying any of these three parameters as zero
           is equivalent to not enforcing the specific limit, and is thus redundant.

       --list-catalog [128-bit-ID...]
           List the contents of the message catalog as a table of message IDs, plus their short
           description strings.

           If any 128-bit-IDs are specified, only those entries are shown.

       --dump-catalog [128-bit-ID...]
           Show the contents of the message catalog, with entries separated by a line consisting
           of two dashes and the ID (the format is the same as .catalog files).

           If any 128-bit-IDs are specified, only those entries are shown.

       --update-catalog
           Update the message catalog index. This command needs to be executed each time new
           catalog files are installed, removed, or updated to rebuild the binary catalog index.

       --setup-keys
           Instead of showing journal contents, generate a new key pair for Forward Secure
           Sealing (FSS). This will generate a sealing key and a verification key. The sealing
           key is stored in the journal data directory and shall remain on the host. The
           verification key should be stored externally. Refer to the Seal= option in
           journald.conf(5) for information on Forward Secure Sealing and for a link to a
           refereed scholarly paper detailing the cryptographic theory it is based on.

       --force
           When --setup-keys is passed and Forward Secure Sealing (FSS) has already been
           configured, recreate FSS keys.

       --interval=
           Specifies the change interval for the sealing key when generating an FSS key pair with
           --setup-keys. Shorter intervals increase CPU consumption but shorten the time range of
           undetectable journal alterations. Defaults to 15min.

       --verify
           Check the journal file for internal consistency. If the file has been generated with
           FSS enabled and the FSS verification key has been specified with --verify-key=,
           authenticity of the journal file is verified.

       --verify-key=
           Specifies the FSS verification key to use for the --verify operation.

       --sync
           Asks the journal daemon to write all yet unwritten journal data to the backing file
           system and synchronize all journals. This call does not return until the
           synchronization operation is complete. This command guarantees that any log messages
           written before its invocation are safely stored on disk at the time it returns.

       --flush
           Asks the journal daemon to flush any log data stored in /run/log/journal into
           /var/log/journal, if persistent storage is enabled. This call does not return until
           the operation is complete. Note that this call is idempotent: the data is only flushed
           from /run/log/journal into /var/log/journal once during system runtime, and this
           command exits cleanly without executing any operation if this has already happened.
           This command effectively guarantees that all data is flushed to /var/log/journal at
           the time it returns.

       --rotate
           Asks the journal daemon to rotate journal files. This call does not return until the
           rotation operation is complete.

       -h, --help
           Print a short help text and exit.

       --version
           Print a short version string and exit.

       --no-pager
           Do not pipe output into a pager.

EXIT STATUS

       On success, 0 is returned; otherwise, a non-zero failure code is returned.

ENVIRONMENT

       $SYSTEMD_PAGER
           Pager to use when --no-pager is not given; overrides $PAGER. If neither $SYSTEMD_PAGER
           nor $PAGER are set, a set of well-known pager implementations are tried in turn,
           including less(1) and more(1), until one is found. If no pager implementation is
           discovered no pager is invoked. Setting this environment variable to an empty string
           or the value "cat" is equivalent to passing --no-pager.

       $SYSTEMD_LESS
           Override the options passed to less (by default "FRSXMK").

       $SYSTEMD_LESSCHARSET
           Override the charset passed to less (by default "utf-8", if the invoking terminal is
           determined to be UTF-8 compatible).

EXAMPLES

       Without arguments, all collected logs are shown unfiltered:

           journalctl

       With one match specified, all entries with a field matching the expression are shown:

           journalctl _SYSTEMD_UNIT=avahi-daemon.service

       If two different fields are matched, only entries matching both expressions at the same
       time are shown:

           journalctl _SYSTEMD_UNIT=avahi-daemon.service _PID=28097

       If two matches refer to the same field, all entries matching either expression are shown:

           journalctl _SYSTEMD_UNIT=avahi-daemon.service _SYSTEMD_UNIT=dbus.service

       If the separator "+" is used, two expressions may be combined in a logical OR. The
       following will show all messages from the Avahi service process with the PID 28097 plus
       all messages from the D-Bus service (from any of its processes):

           journalctl _SYSTEMD_UNIT=avahi-daemon.service _PID=28097 + _SYSTEMD_UNIT=dbus.service

       Show all logs generated by the D-Bus executable:

           journalctl /usr/bin/dbus-daemon

       Show all kernel logs from previous boot:

           journalctl -k -b -1

       Show a live log display from a system service apache.service:

           journalctl -f -u apache

SEE ALSO

       systemd(1), systemd-journald.service(8), systemctl(1), coredumpctl(1), systemd.journal-
       fields(7), journald.conf(5), systemd.time(7), systemd-journal-remote(8), systemd-journal-
       upload(8)

NOTES

        1. Journal Export Format
           https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/export

        2. Journal JSON Format
           https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/json

        3. Server-Sent Events
           https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Server-sent_events/Using_server-sent_events

        4. Message Catalog Developer Documentation
           https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/catalog