NAME

       hostnamectl - Control the system hostname

SYNOPSIS

       hostnamectl [OPTIONS...] {COMMAND}

DESCRIPTION

       hostnamectl may be used to query and change the system hostname and related settings.

       This tool distinguishes three different hostnames: the high-level "pretty" hostname which might include
       all kinds of special characters (e.g. "Lennart's Laptop"), the static hostname which is used to
       initialize the kernel hostname at boot (e.g. "lennarts-laptop"), and the transient hostname which is a
       fallback value received from network configuration. If a static hostname is set, and is valid (something
       other than localhost), then the transient hostname is not used.

       Note that the pretty hostname has little restrictions on the characters used, while the static and
       transient hostnames are limited to the usually accepted characters of Internet domain names.

       The static hostname is stored in /etc/hostname, see hostname(5) for more information. The pretty
       hostname, chassis type, and icon name are stored in /etc/machine-info, see machine-info(5).

       Use systemd-firstboot(1) to initialize the system host name for mounted (but not booted) system images.

OPTIONS

       The following options are understood:

       --no-ask-password
           Do not query the user for authentication for privileged operations.

       --static, --transient, --pretty
           If status is used (or no explicit command is given) and one of those fields is given, hostnamectl
           will print out just this selected hostname.

           If used with set-hostname, only the selected hostname(s) will be updated. When more than one of those
           options is used, all the specified hostnames will be updated.

       -H, --host=
           Execute the operation remotely. Specify a hostname, or a username and hostname separated by "@", to
           connect to. The hostname may optionally be suffixed by a container name, separated by ":", which
           connects directly to a specific container on the specified host. This will use SSH to talk to the
           remote machine manager instance. Container names may be enumerated with machinectl -H HOST.

       -M, --machine=
           Execute operation on a local container. Specify a container name to connect to.

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

       --version
           Print a short version string and exit.

       The following commands are understood:

       status
           Show current system hostname and related information.

       set-hostname NAME
           Set the system hostname to NAME. By default, this will alter the pretty, the static, and the
           transient hostname alike; however, if one or more of --static, --transient, --pretty are used, only
           the selected hostnames are changed. If the pretty hostname is being set, and static or transient are
           being set as well, the specified hostname will be simplified in regards to the character set used
           before the latter are updated. This is done by replacing spaces with "-" and removing special
           characters. This ensures that the pretty and the static hostname are always closely related while
           still following the validity rules of the specific name. This simplification of the hostname string
           is not done if only the transient and/or static host names are set, and the pretty host name is left
           untouched.

           Pass the empty string "" as the hostname to reset the selected hostnames to their default (usually
           "localhost").

       set-icon-name NAME
           Set the system icon name to NAME. The icon name is used by some graphical applications to visualize
           this host. The icon name should follow the Icon Naming Specification[1].

           Pass an empty string to reset the icon name to the default value, which is determined from chassis
           type (see below) and possibly other parameters.

       set-chassis TYPE
           Set the chassis type to TYPE. The chassis type is used by some graphical applications to visualize
           the host or alter user interaction. Currently, the following chassis types are defined: "desktop",
           "laptop", "server", "tablet", "handset", "watch", "embedded", as well as the special chassis types
           "vm" and "container" for virtualized systems that lack an immediate physical chassis.

           Pass an empty string to reset the chassis type to the default value which is determined from the
           firmware and possibly other parameters.

       set-deployment ENVIRONMENT
           Set the deployment environment description.  ENVIRONMENT must be a single word without any control
           characters. One of the following is suggested: "development", "integration", "staging", "production".

           Pass an empty string to reset to the default empty value.

       set-location LOCATION
           Set the location string for the system, if it is known.  LOCATION should be a human-friendly,
           free-form string describing the physical location of the system, if it is known and applicable. This
           may be as generic as "Berlin, Germany" or as specific as "Left Rack, 2nd Shelf".

           Pass an empty string to reset to the default empty value.

EXIT STATUS

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

SEE ALSO

       systemd(1), hostname(1), hostname(5), machine-info(5), systemctl(1), systemd-hostnamed.service(8),
       systemd-firstboot(1)

NOTES

        1. Icon Naming Specification
           http://standards.freedesktop.org/icon-naming-spec/icon-naming-spec-latest.html

systemd 229                                                                                       HOSTNAMECTL(1)