FREEBSD-VERSION(1) BSD General Commands Manual FREEBSD-VERSION(1)
NAME
freebsd-version -- print the version and patch level of the installed system
SYNOPSIS
freebsd-version [-ku]
DESCRIPTION
The freebsd-version utility makes a best effort to determine the version and patch level of the installed kernel and / or userland.
The following options are available:
-k Print the version and patch level of the installed kernel. Unlike uname(1), if a new kernel has been installed but the system
has not yet rebooted, freebsd-version will print the version and patch level of the new kernel.
-u Print the version and patch level of the installed userland. These are hardcoded into freebsd-version during the build.
If both -k and -u are specified, freebsd-version will print the kernel version first, then the userland version, on separate lines. If nei-
ther is specified, it will print the userland version only.
IMPLEMENTATION NOTES
The freebsd-version utility should provide the correct answer in the vast majority of cases, including on systems kept up-to-date using
freebsd-update(8), which does not update the kernel version unless the kernel itself was affected by the latest patch.
To determine the name (and hence the location) of a custom kernel, the freebsd-version utility will attempt to parse
/boot/defaults/loader.conf and /boot/loader.conf, looking for definitions of the kernel and bootfile variables, both with a default value of
``kernel''. It may however fail to locate the correct kernel if either or both of these variables are defined in a non-standard location,
such as in /boot/loader.rc.
ENVIRONMENT
ROOT Path to the root of the filesystem in which to look for loader.conf and the kernel.
EXAMPLES
To determine the version of the currently running userland:
/bin/freebsd-version -u
To inspect a system being repaired using a live CD:
mount -rt ufs /dev/ada0p2 /mnt
env ROOT=/mnt /mnt/bin/freebsd-version -ku
SEE ALSO
uname(1), loader.conf(5), freebsd-version(8)
HISTORY
The freebsd-version command appeared in FreeBSD 10.0.
AUTHORS
The freebsd-version utility and this manual page were written by Dag-Erling Smorgrav <des@FreeBSD.org>.
BSD
October 5, 2013 BSD