1dbus-send(1) General Commands Manual dbus-send(1)
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6 dbus-send - Send a message to a message bus
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9 dbus-send [--system | --session] [--dest=NAME] [--print-reply]
10 [--type=TYPE] <destination object path> <message name> [contents ...]
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14 The dbus-send command is used to send a message to a D-Bus message bus.
15 See http://www.freedesktop.org/software/dbus/ for more information
16 about the big picture.
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19 There are two well-known message buses: the systemwide message bus
20 (installed on many systems as the "messagebus" service) and the per-
21 user-login-session message bus (started each time a user logs in). The
22 --system and --session options direct dbus-send to send messages to the
23 system or session buses respectively. If neither is specified, dbus-
24 send sends to the session bus.
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27 Nearly all uses of dbus-send must provide the --dest argument which is
28 the name of a connection on the bus to send the message to. If --dest
29 is omitted, no destination is set.
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32 The object path and the name of the message to send must always be
33 specified. Following arguments, if any, are the message contents (mes‐
34 sage arguments). These are given as type-specified values and may
35 include containers (arrays, dicts, and variants) as described below.
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37 <contents> ::= <item> | <container> [ <item> | <container>...]
38 <item> ::= <type>:<value>
39 <container> ::= <array> | <dict> | <variant>
40 <array> ::= array:<type>:<value>[,<value>...]
41 <dict> ::= dict:<type>:<type>:<key>,<value>[,<key>,<value>...]
42 <variant> ::= variant:<type>:<value>
43 <type> ::= string | int16 | uint 16 | int32 | uint32 | int64 | uint64 | double | byte | boolean | objpath
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45 D-Bus supports more types than these, but dbus-send currently does not.
46 Also, dbus-send does not permit empty containers or nested containers
47 (e.g. arrays of variants).
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50 Here is an example invocation:
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52 dbus-send --dest=org.freedesktop.ExampleName \
53 /org/freedesktop/sample/object/name \
54 org.freedesktop.ExampleInterface.ExampleMethod \
55 int32:47 string:'hello world' double:65.32 \
56 array:string:"1st item","next item","last item" \
57 dict:string:int32:"one",1,"two",2,"three",3 \
58 variant:int32:-8 \
59 objpath:/org/freedesktop/sample/object/name
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62 Note that the interface is separated from a method or signal name by a
63 dot, though in the actual protocol the interface and the interface mem‐
64 ber are separate fields.
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68 The following options are supported:
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70 --dest=NAME
71 Specify the name of the connection to receive the message.
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73 --print-reply
74 Block for a reply to the message sent, and print any reply
75 received.
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77 --system
78 Send to the system message bus.
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80 --session
81 Send to the session message bus. (This is the default.)
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83 --type=TYPE
84 Specify "method_call" or "signal" (defaults to "signal").
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88 dbus-send was written by Philip Blundell.
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92 Please send bug reports to the D-Bus mailing list or bug tracker, see
93 http://www.freedesktop.org/software/dbus/
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97 dbus-send(1)