1FSCK(8) System Administration FSCK(8)
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6 fsck.minix - check consistency of Minix filesystem
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9 fsck.minix [-larvsmf] device
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12 fsck.minix performs a consistency check for the Linux MINIX filesystem.
13 The current version supports the 14 character and 30 character filename
14 options.
15 The program assumes the filesystem is quiescent. fsck.minix should not
17 be used on a mounted device unless you can be sure nobody is writing to
18 it (and remember that the kernel can write to it when it searches for
19 files).
20 The device name will usually have the following form:
22 /dev/hda[1-63] (IDE disk 1)
23 /dev/hdb[1-63] (IDE disk 2)
24 /dev/sda[1-15] (SCSI disk 1)
25 /dev/sdb[1-15] (SCSI disk 2)
26 If the filesystem was changed (i.e., repaired), then fsck.minix will
28 print "FILE SYSTEM HAS CHANGED" and will sync(2) three times before
29 exiting. Since Linux does not currently have raw devices, there is no
30 need to reboot at this time.
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33 fsck.minix should not be used on a mounted filesystem. Using
34 fsck.minix on a mounted filesystem is very dangerous, due to the possi‐
35 bility that deleted files are still in use, and can seriously damage a
36 perfectly good filesystem! If you absolutely have to run fsck.minix on
37 a mounted filesystem (i.e., the root filesystem), make sure nothing is
38 writing to the disk, and that no files are "zombies" waiting for dele‐
39 tion.
40
42 -l List all filenames.
43 -r Perform interactive repairs.
45 -a Perform automatic repairs. (This option implies -r and serves
47 to answer all of the questions asked with the default.) Note
48 that this can be extremely dangerous in the case of extensive
49 filesystem damage.
50 -v Be verbose.
52 -s Output super-block information.
54 -m Activate MINIX-like "mode not cleared" warnings.
56 -f Force a filesystem check even if the filesystem was marked as
58 valid (this marking is done by the kernel when the filesystem is
59 unmounted).
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62 fsck(8), fsck.ext2(8), mkfs(8), mkfs.minix(8), mkfs.ext2(8), reboot(8)
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65 There are numerous diagnostic messages. The ones mentioned here are
66 the most commonly seen in normal usage.
67 If the device does not exist, fsck.minix will print "unable to read
69 super block". If the device exists, but is not a MINIX filesystem,
70 fsck.minix will print "bad magic number in super-block".
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73 The exit code returned by fsck.minix is the sum of the following:
74 0 No errors
76 3 Filesystem errors corrected, system should be rebooted if
78 filesystem was mounted
79 4 Filesystem errors left uncorrected
81 7 Combination of exit codes 3 and 4
83 8 Operational error
85 16 Usage or syntax error
87 In point of fact, only 0, 3, 4, 7, 8, and 16 can ever be returned.
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91 Linus Torvalds (torvalds@cs.helsinki.fi)
92 Error code values by Rik Faith (faith@cs.unc.edu)
93 Added support for filesystem valid flag: Dr. Wettstein
94 (greg%wind.uucp@plains.nodak.edu)
95 Check to prevent fsck of mounted filesystem added by Daniel Quinlan
96 (quinlan@yggdrasil.com)
97 Minix v2 fs support by Andreas Schwab (schwab@issan.informatik.uni-
98 dortmund.de), updated by Nicolai Langfeldt (janl@math.uio.no)
99 Portability patch by Russell King (rmk@ecs.soton.ac.uk).
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102 The fsck.minix command is part of the util-linux package and is avail‐
103 able from ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/.
104util-linux July 1996 FSCK(8)