NAME
    BusyBox - The Swiss Army Knife of Embedded Linux

SYNTAX
     BusyBox <function> [arguments...]  # or

     <function> [arguments...]          # if symlinked

DESCRIPTION
    BusyBox combines tiny versions of many common UNIX utilities into a
    single small executable. It provides minimalist replacements for most of
    the utilities you usually find in GNU coreutils, util-linux, etc. The
    utilities in BusyBox generally have fewer options than their
    full-featured GNU cousins; however, the options that are included
    provide the expected functionality and behave very much like their GNU
    counterparts.

    BusyBox has been written with size-optimization and limited resources in
    mind. It is also extremely modular so you can easily include or exclude
    commands (or features) at compile time. This makes it easy to customize
    your embedded systems. To create a working system, just add /dev, /etc,
    and a Linux kernel. BusyBox provides a fairly complete POSIX environment
    for any small or embedded system.

    BusyBox is extremely configurable. This allows you to include only the
    components you need, thereby reducing binary size. Run 'make config' or
    'make menuconfig' to select the functionality that you wish to enable.
    The run 'make' to compile BusyBox using your configuration.

    After the compile has finished, you should use 'make install' to install
    BusyBox. This will install the '/bin/busybox' binary, and will also
    create symlinks pointing to the '/bin/busybox' binary for each utility
    that you compile into BusyBox. By default, 'make install' will place
    these symlinks into the './_install' directory, unless you have defined
    'PREFIX', thereby specifying some alternative location (i.e., 'make
    PREFIX=/tmp/foo install'). If you wish to install using hardlinks,
    rather than the default of using symlinks, you can use 'make
    PREFIX=/tmp/foo install-hardlinks' instead.

USAGE
    BusyBox is a multi-call binary. A multi-call binary is an executable
    program that performs the same job as more than one utility program.
    That means there is just a single BusyBox binary, but that single binary
    acts like a large number of utilities. This allows BusyBox to be smaller
    since all the built-in utility programs (we call them applets) can share
    code for many common operations.

    You can also invoke BusyBox by issuing a command as an argument on the
    command line. For example, entering

            /bin/busybox ls

    will also cause BusyBox to behave as 'ls'.

    Of course, adding '/bin/busybox' into every command would be painful. So
    most people will invoke BusyBox using links to the BusyBox binary.

    For example, entering

            ln -s /bin/busybox ls
            ./ls

    will cause BusyBox to behave as 'ls' (if the 'ls' command has been
    compiled into BusyBox). Generally speaking, you should never need to
    make all these links yourself, as the BusyBox build system will do this
    for you when you run the 'make install' command.

    If you invoke BusyBox with no arguments, it will provide you with a list
    of the applets that have been compiled into your BusyBox binary.

COMMON OPTIONS
    Most BusyBox commands support the --help argument to provide a terse
    runtime description of their behavior. If the
    CONFIG_FEATURE_VERBOSE_USAGE option has been enabled, more detailed
    usage information will also be available.

COMMANDS
    Currently defined functions include:

            addgroup, adduser, adjtimex, ar, arping, ash, awk, basename, bunzip2,
            busybox, bzcat, cal, cat, chgrp, chmod, chown, chroot, chvt, clear, cmp,
            cp, cpio, crond, crontab, cut, date, dc, dd, deallocvt, delgroup, deluser,
            devfsd, df, dirname, dmesg, dos2unix, dpkg, dpkg-deb, du, dumpkmap,
            dumpleases, echo, egrep, env, expr, false, fbset, fdflush, fdformat, fdisk,
            fgrep, find, fold, free, freeramdisk, fsck.minix, ftpget, ftpput, getopt,
            getty, grep, gunzip, gzip, halt, hdparm, head, hexdump, hostid, hostname,
            httpd, hush, hwclock, id, ifconfig, ifdown, ifup, inetd, init, insmod,
            install, ip, ipcalc, iplink, iproute, iptunnel, kill, killall, klogd, lash,
            last, length, linuxrc, ln, loadfont, loadkmap, logger, login, logname,
            logread, losetup, ls, lsmod, makedevs, md5sum, mesg, mkdir, mkfifo,
            mkfs.minix, mknod, mkswap, mktemp, modprobe, more, mount, msh, mt, mv,
            nameif, nc, netstat, nslookup, od, openvt, passwd, patch, pidof, ping,
            ping6, pipe_progress, pivot_root, poweroff, printf, ps, pwd, rdate,
            readlink, realpath, reboot, renice, reset, rm, rmdir, rmmod, route, rpm,
            rpm2cpio, run-parts, rx, sed, seq, setkeycodes, sha1sum, sleep, sort,
            start-stop-daemon, strings, stty, su, sulogin, swapoff, swapon, sync,
            sysctl, syslogd, tail, tar, tee, telnet, telnetd, test, tftp, time, top,
            touch, tr, traceroute, true, tty, udhcpc, udhcpd, umount, uname,
            uncompress, uniq, unix2dos, unzip, uptime, usleep, uudecode, uuencode,
            vconfig, vi, vlock, watch, watchdog, wc, wget, which, who, whoami, xargs,
            yes, zcat

COMMAND DESCRIPTIONS
LIBC NSS
    GNU Libc (glibc) uses the Name Service Switch (NSS) to configure the
    behavior of the C library for the local environment, and to configure
    how it reads system data, such as passwords and group information. This
    is implemented using an /etc/nsswitch.conf configuration file, and using
    one or more of the /lib/libnss_* libraries. BusyBox tries to avoid using
    any libc calls that make use of NSS. Some applets however, such as login
    and su, will use libc functions that require NSS.

    If you enable CONFIG_USE_BB_PWD_GRP, BusyBox will use internal functions
    to directly access the /etc/passwd, /etc/group, and /etc/shadow files
    without using NSS. This may allow you to run your system without the
    need for installing any of the NSS configuration files and libraries.

    When used with glibc, the BusyBox 'networking' applets will similarly
    require that you install at least some of the glibc NSS stuff (in
    particular, /etc/nsswitch.conf, /lib/libnss_dns*, /lib/libnss_files*,
    and /lib/libresolv*).

    Shameless Plug: As an alternative, one could use a C library such as
    uClibc. In addition to making your system significantly smaller, uClibc
    does not require the use of any NSS support files or libraries.

MAINTAINER
    Erik Andersen <andersen@codepoet.org>

AUTHORS
    The following people have contributed code to BusyBox whether they know
    it or not. If you have written code included in BusyBox, you should
    probably be listed here so you can obtain your bit of eternal glory. If
    you should be listed here, or the description of what you have done
    needs more detail, or is incorect, please send in an update.

    Emanuele Aina <emanuele.aina@tiscali.it> run-parts

    Erik Andersen <andersen@codepoet.org>

        Tons of new stuff, major rewrite of most of the
        core apps, tons of new apps as noted in header files.
        Lots of tedious effort writing these boring docs that
        nobody is going to actually read.

    Laurence Anderson <l.d.anderson@warwick.ac.uk>

        rpm2cpio, unzip, get_header_cpio, read_gz interface, rpm

    Jeff Angielski <jeff@theptrgroup.com>

        ftpput, ftpget

    Edward Betts <edward@debian.org>

        expr, hostid, logname, whoami

    John Beppu <beppu@codepoet.org>

        du, nslookup, sort

    Brian Candler <B.Candler@pobox.com>

        tiny-ls(ls)

    Randolph Chung <tausq@debian.org>

        fbset, ping, hostname

    Dave Cinege <dcinege@psychosis.com>

        more(v2), makedevs, dutmp, modularization, auto links file,
        various fixes, Linux Router Project maintenance

    Jordan Crouse <jordan@cosmicpenguin.net>

            ipcalc

    Magnus Damm <damm@opensource.se>

        tftp client insmod powerpc support

    Larry Doolittle <ldoolitt@recycle.lbl.gov>

        pristine source directory compilation, lots of patches and fixes.

    Glenn Engel <glenne@engel.org>

        httpd

    Gennady Feldman <gfeldman@gena01.com>

        Sysklogd (single threaded syslogd, IPC Circular buffer support,
        logread), various fixes.

    Karl M. Hegbloom <karlheg@debian.org>

        cp_mv.c, the test suite, various fixes to utility.c, &c.

    Daniel Jacobowitz <dan@debian.org>

        mktemp.c

    Matt Kraai <kraai@alumni.cmu.edu>

        documentation, bugfixes, test suite

    Stephan Linz <linz@li-pro.net>

            ipcalc, Red Hat equivalence

    John Lombardo <john@deltanet.com>

        tr

    Glenn McGrath <bug1@iinet.net.au>

        Common unarchving code and unarchiving applets, ifupdown, ftpgetput,
        nameif, sed, patch, fold, install, uudecode.
        Various bugfixes, review and apply numerous patches.

    Manuel Novoa III <mjn3@codepoet.org>

        cat, head, mkfifo, mknod, rmdir, sleep, tee, tty, uniq, usleep, wc, yes,
        mesg, vconfig, make_directory, parse_mode, dirname, mode_string,
        get_last_path_component, simplify_path, and a number trivial libbb routines

        also bug fixes, partial rewrites, and size optimizations in
        ash, basename, cal, cmp, cp, df, du, echo, env, ln, logname, md5sum, mkdir,
        mv, realpath, rm, sort, tail, touch, uname, watch, arith, human_readable,
        interface, dutmp, ifconfig, route

    Vladimir Oleynik <dzo@simtreas.ru>

        cmdedit; xargs(current), httpd(current);
        ports: ash, crond, fdisk, inetd, stty, traceroute, top;
        locale, various fixes
        and irreconcilable critic of everything not perfect.

    Bruce Perens <bruce@pixar.com>

        Original author of BusyBox in 1995, 1996. Some of his code can
        still be found hiding here and there...

    Tim Riker <Tim@Rikers.org>

        bug fixes, member of fan club

    Kent Robotti <robotti@metconnect.com>

        reset, tons and tons of bug reports and patches.

    Chip Rosenthal <chip@unicom.com>, <crosenth@covad.com>

        wget - Contributed by permission of Covad Communications

    Pavel Roskin <proski@gnu.org>

        Lots of bugs fixes and patches.

    Gyepi Sam <gyepi@praxis-sw.com>

        Remote logging feature for syslogd

    Linus Torvalds <torvalds@transmeta.com>

        mkswap, fsck.minix, mkfs.minix

    Mark Whitley <markw@codepoet.org>

        grep, sed, cut, xargs(previous),
        style-guide, new-applet-HOWTO, bug fixes, etc.

    Charles P. Wright <cpwright@villagenet.com>

        gzip, mini-netcat(nc)

    Enrique Zanardi <ezanardi@ull.es>

        tarcat (since removed), loadkmap, various fixes, Debian maintenance

    Tito Ragusa <farmatito@tiscali.it>

            devfsd and size optimizations in strings, openvt and deallocvt.

