1UTMPDUMP(1) User Commands UTMPDUMP(1)
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6 utmpdump - dump UTMP and WTMP files in raw format
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9 utmpdump [options] filename
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12 utmpdump is a simple program to dump UTMP and WTMP files in raw format,
13 so they can be examined. utmpdump reads from stdin unless a filename is
14 passed.
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17 -f, --follow
18 Output appended data as the file grows.
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20 -o, --output file
21 Write command output to file instead of standard output.
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23 -r, --reverse
24 Undump, write back edited login information into the utmp or wtmp
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27 -h, --help
28 Display help text and exit.
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30 -V, --version
31 Print version and exit.
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34 utmpdump can be useful in cases of corrupted utmp or wtmp entries. It
35 can dump out utmp/wtmp to an ASCII file, which can then be edited to
36 remove bogus entries, and reintegrated using:
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38 utmpdump -r < ascii_file > wtmp
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40 But be warned, utmpdump was written for debugging purposes only.
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42 File formats
43 Only the binary version of the utmp(5) is standardised. Textual dumps
44 may become incompatible in future.
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46 The version 2.28 was the last one that printed text output using
47 ctime(3) timestamp format. Newer dumps use millisecond precision
48 ISO-8601 timestamp format in UTC-0 timezone. Conversion from former
49 timestamp format can be made to binary, although attempt to do so can
50 lead the timestamps to drift amount of timezone offset.
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53 You may not use the -r option, as the format for the utmp/wtmp files
54 strongly depends on the input format. This tool was not written for
55 normal use, but for debugging only.
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58 Michael Krapp
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61 last(1), w(1), who(1), utmp(5)
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64 For bug reports, use the issue tracker at
65 https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues.
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68 The utmpdump command is part of the util-linux package which can be
69 downloaded from Linux Kernel Archive
70 <https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>.
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74util-linux 2.39.2 2023-06-14 UTMPDUMP(1)