Linux Commands : Kernel administration commands

Quick commands on linux administration continued...

Kernel administration command,

LSMOD is used to list the loaded modules on the kernel, the usage is:

$lsmod

Module Size Used by
autofs 11904 1 (autoclean)
3c59x 25568 1 (autoclean)
iptable_filter 2288 0 (autoclean) (unused)
md 59008 0 (unused)
usb-uhci 20912 0 (unused)
usbcore 53200 1 [usb-uhci]


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MODINFO is the command used to learn about the modules active on the kernel.

usage:
$/sbin/modinfo usb-uhci

filename: /lib/modules/2.4.4-18k/kernel/drivers/usb/usb-uhci.o
description: "USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver"
author: "Georg Acher, Deti Fliegl, Thomas Sailer, Roman Weissgaerber"

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INSMOD is the command used to activate or to add in the command to an active kernel. The syntax is :

$insmod msdos

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RMMOD is the command used to remove any modules that you find running on the server. The list of modules can be found using the command lsmod.

$rmmod msdos

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DEPMOD is the command used to create the dependencies list for the modules. Normally the details are fetched from /etc/modules.conf and have the descriptions added up.

The normal usage of the same is : /sbin/depmod -a

There are other options like depmod -A which should perform the quick check on the dependencies.

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MODPROBE is another important command that helps the users to load the modules and the dependencies for the functioning. If we are to use

modprobe fat

then it should be loading up the fat module along with the supporting modules. Again,

modprobe -r fat

should remove the module fat along with the supporting modules for the fat.

This should provide you with the best removal technique.

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more coming...