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e2fsck.conf(5)							e2fsck.conf(5)

NAME
       e2fsck.conf - Configuration file for e2fsck

DESCRIPTION
       e2fsck.conf  is	the configuration file for e2fsck(8).  It controls the
       default behavior of e2fsck(8) while it is checking ext2, ext3, or  ext4
       filesystems.

       The  e2fsck.conf	 file uses an INI-style format.	 Stanzas, or top-level
       sections, are delimited by square braces: [ ].	Within	each  section,
       each  line  defines  a  relation, which assigns tags to values, or to a
       subsection, which contains further relations or subsections.  An	 exam‐
       ple  of	the  INI-style	format used by this configuration file follows
       below:

	    [section1]
		 tag1 = value_a
		 tag1 = value_b
		 tag2 = value_c

	    [section 2]
		 tag3 = {
		      subtag1 = subtag_value_a
		      subtag1 = subtag_value_b
		      subtag2 = subtag_value_c
		 }
		 tag1 = value_d
		 tag2 = value_e
	    }

       Comments are delimited by a semicolon (';') or a hash  ('#')  character
       at  the beginning of the comment, and are terminated by the end of line
       character.

       Tags and values must be quoted using double quotes if they contain spa‐
       ces.   Within  a	 quoted string, the standard backslash interpretations
       apply: "\n" (for the newline character), "\t" (for the tab  character),
       "\b" (for the backspace character), and "\\" (for the backslash charac‐
       ter).

       The following stanzas are used in the e2fsck.conf file.	They  will  be
       described in more detail in future sections of this document.

       [options]
	      This   stanza  contains  general	configuration  parameters  for
	      e2fsck's behavior.

       [problems]
	      This stanza allows the administrator to reconfigure  how	e2fsck
	      handles various filesystem inconsistencies.

       [scratch_files]
	      This  stanza  controls  when  e2fsck will attempt to use scratch
	      files to reduce the need for memory.

THE [options] STANZA
       The following relations are defined in the [options] stanza.

       allow_cancellation
	      If this relation is set to a boolean value of true, then if  the
	      user  interrupts	e2fsck	using  ^C,  and	 the filesystem is not
	      explicitly flagged as containing errors, e2fsck will  exit  with
	      an  exit	status	of  0 instead of 32.  This setting defaults to
	      false.

       accept_time_fudge
	      Unfortunately, due to Windows' unfortunate  design  decision  to
	      configure	 the  hardware clock to tick localtime, instead of the
	      more proper and less error-prone UTC time, many users end up  in
	      the  situation  where the system clock is incorrectly set at the
	      time when e2fsck is run.

	      Historically this was usually due to some	 distributions	having
	      buggy  init  scripts  and/or  installers	that  didn't correctly
	      detect this case and take appropriate countermeasures.  However,
	      it's still possible, despite the best efforts of init script and
	      installer authors to not be able to  detect  this	 misconfigura‐
	      tion,  usually  due  to  a buggy or misconfigured virtualization
	      manager or the installer not having access  to  a	 network  time
	      server during the installation process.  So by default, we allow
	      the superblock times to be fudged by up to 24 hours.   This  can
	      be disabled by setting accept_time_fudge to the boolean value of
	      false.  This setting defaults to true.

       broken_system_clock
	      The e2fsck(8) program has some heuristics that assume  that  the
	      system clock is correct.	In addition, many system programs make
	      similar assumptions.  For example, the UUID library  depends  on
	      time  not going backwards in order for it to be able to make its
	      guarantees about issuing universally unique ID's.	 Systems  with
	      broken  system clocks, are well, broken.	However, broken system
	      clocks, particularly in embedded systems, do exist.  E2fsck will
	      attempt  to  use	heuristics to determine if the time can not be
	      trusted; and to skip time-based checks if this is true.  If this
	      boolean  is set to true, then e2fsck will always assume that the
	      system clock can not be trusted.

       buggy_init_scripts
	      This boolean relation is	an  alias  for	accept_time_fudge  for
	      backwards compatibility; it used to be that the behavior defined
	      by   accept_time_fudge   above   defaulted   to	 false,	   and
	      buggy_init_scripts  would	 enable	 superblock  time  field to be
	      wrong by up to 24 hours.	When we changed the default,  we  also
	      renamed this boolean relation to accept_time_fudge.

       clear_test_fs_flag
	      This  boolean  relation  controls	 whether or not e2fsck(8) will
	      offer to clear the test_fs flag if the ext4 filesystem is avail‐
	      able on the system.  It defaults to true.

       defer_check_on_battery
	      This  boolean  relation  controls	 whether  or  not the interval
	      between filesystem checks (either based on  time	or  number  of
	      mounts)  should  be doubled if the system is running on battery.
	      This setting defaults to true.

       indexed_dir_slack_percentage
	      When e2fsck(8) repacks a indexed directory, reserve  the	speci‐
	      fied  percentage of empty space in each leaf nodes so that a few
	      new entries can be added to the directory without splitting leaf
	      nodes,  so  that	the  average  fill ratio of directories can be
	      maintained at a higher, more  efficient  level.	This  relation
	      defaults to 20 percent.

       log_dir
	      If  the log_filename relation contains a relative pathname, then
	      the log file will be  placed  in	the  directory	named  by  the
	      log_dir relation.

       log_dir_fallback
	      This  relation contains an alternate directory that will be used
	      if the directory specified by log_dir is not available or is not
	      writeable.

       log_dir_wait
	      If this boolean relation is true, them if the directories speci‐
	      fied by log_dir or log_dir_fallback are not available or are not
	      yet  writeable,  e2fsck will save the output in a memory buffer,
	      and a child process will periodically test to  see  if  the  log
	      directory	 has  become  available	 after	the  boot sequence has
	      mounted the requiste filesytem for reading/writing.  This imple‐
	      ments  the  functionality	 provided by logsave(8) for e2fsck log
	      files.

       log_filename
	      This relation specifies the file name where a copy  of  e2fsck's
	      output  will  be	written.   If certain problem reports are sup‐
	      pressed using the max_count_problems relation,  (or  on  a  per-
	      problem  basis  using  the  max_count relation), the full set of
	      problem reports will be written to the log file.	 The  filename
	      may contain various percent-expressions (%D, %T, %N, etc.) which
	      will be expanded so that the file name  for  the	log  file  can
	      include  things like date, time, device name, and other run-time
	      parameters.  See the LOGGING section for more details.

       max_count_problems
	      This relation specifies the maximum number of problem reports of
	      a particular type will be printed to stdout before further prob‐
	      lem reports of that type are squelched.  This can be  useful  if
	      the  console is slow (i.e., connected to a serial port) and so a
	      large amount of output could end up delaying  the	 boot  process
	      for a long time (potentially hours).

       report_features
	      If  this	boolean	 relation  is true, e2fsck will print the file
	      system features as part of its verbose reporting (i.e.,  if  the
	      -v option is specified)

       report_time
	      If  this	boolean	 relation  is  true, e2fsck will run as if the
	      options -tt are always specified.	 This  will  cause  e2fsck  to
	      print  timing  statistics	 on a pass by pass basis for full file
	      system checks.

       report_verbose
	      If this boolean relation is true, e2fsck	will  run  as  if  the
	      option  -v is always specified.  This will cause e2fsck to print
	      some additional information at the end of each full file	system
	      check.

THE [problems] STANZA
       Each tag in the [problems] stanza names a problem code specified with a
       leading "0x" followed by six hex digits.	 The value of  the  tag	 is  a
       subsection  where the relations in that subsection override the default
       treatment of that particular problem code.

       Note that inappropriate settings in this stanza	may  cause  e2fsck  to
       behave  incorrectly,  or even crash.  Most system administrators should
       not be making changes to this section without referring to source code.

       Within each problem code's subsection, the following tags may be used:

       description
	      This relation allows the message	which  is  printed  when  this
	      filesystem inconsistency is detected to be overridden.

       preen_ok
	      This boolean relation overrides the default behavior controlling
	      whether this filesystem problem should  be  automatically	 fixed
	      when e2fsck is running in preen mode.

       max_count
	      This integer relation overrides the max_count_problems parameter
	      (set in the options section) for this particular problem.

       no_ok  This boolean relation overrides the default behavior determining
	      whether  or not the filesystem will be marked as inconsistent if
	      the user declines to fix the reported problem.

       no_default
	      This boolean relation overrides whether the default  answer  for
	      this problem (or question) should be "no".

       preen_nomessage
	      This boolean relation overrides the default behavior controlling
	      whether or not  the  description	for  this  filesystem  problem
	      should be suppressed when e2fsck is running in preen mode.

       no_nomsg
	      This boolean relation overrides the default behavior controlling
	      whether or not  the  description	for  this  filesystem  problem
	      should  be  suppressed  when  a  problem forced not to be fixed,
	      either because e2fsck is run with the -n option or  because  the
	      force_no flag has been set for the problem.

       force_no
	      This  boolean  option, if set to true, forces a problem to never
	      be fixed.	 That is, it will be as if the user  problem  responds
	      'no'  to	the  question of 'should this problem be fixed?'.  The
	      force_no option even overrides the -y option given on  the  com‐
	      mand-line (just for the specific problem, of course).

THE [scratch_files] STANZA
       The following relations are defined in the [scratch_files] stanza.

       directory
	      If the directory named by this relation exists and is writeable,
	      then e2fsck will attempt to use this directory to store  scratch
	      files instead of using in-memory data structures.

       numdirs_threshold
	      If  this relation is set, then in-memory data structures be used
	      if the number of directories in the filesystem  are  fewer  than
	      amount specified.

       dirinfo
	      This relation controls whether or not the scratch file directory
	      is used instead of an in-memory  data  structure	for  directory
	      information.  It defaults to true.

       icount This relation controls whether or not the scratch file directory
	      is used instead of an in-memory  data  structure	when  tracking
	      inode counts.  It defaults to true.

LOGGING
       E2fsck has the facility to save the information from an e2fsck run in a
       directory so that a system administrator can review its output at their
       leisure.	  This allows information captured during the automatic e2fsck
       preen run, as well as a manually started e2fsck run, to	be  saved  for
       posterity.   This  facility is controlled by the log_filename, log_dir,
       log_dir_fallback, and log_dir_wait relations in the [options] stanza.

       The filename in log_filename may contain the following  percent-expres‐
       sions that will be expanded as follows.

       %d     The current day of the month

       %D     The current date; this is a equivalent of %Y%m%d

       %h     The hostname of the system.

       %H     The current hour in 24-hour format (00..23)

       %m     The current month as a two-digit number (01..12)

       %M     The current minute (00..59)

       %N     The  name	 of  the block device containing the file system, with
	      any directory pathname stripped off.

       %p     The pid of the e2fsck process

       %s     The current time	expressed  as  the  number  of	seconds	 since
	      1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC

       %S     The current second (00..59)

       %T     The current time; this is equivalent of %H%M%S

       %u     The name of the user running e2fsck.

       %U     This percent expression does not expand to anything, but it sig‐
	      nals that any following  date  or	 time  expressions  should  be
	      expressed in UTC time instead of the local timzeone.

       %y     The last two digits of the current year (00..99)

       %Y     The current year (i.e., 2012).

EXAMPLES
       The  following recipe will prevent e2fsck from aborting during the boot
       process when a filesystem contains orphaned files.  (Of course, this is
       not  always  a  good idea, since critical files that are needed for the
       security of the system could potentially	 end  up  in  lost+found,  and
       starting	 the  system without first having a system administrator check
       things out may be dangerous.)

	    [problems]
		 0x040002 = {
		      preen_ok = true
		      description = "@u @i %i.	"
		 }

       The following recipe will cause an e2fsck logfile to be written to  the
       directory  /var/log/e2fsck,  with  a  filename that contains the device
       name, the hostname of the system, the date, and	time:  e.g.,  "e2fsck-
       sda3.server.INFO.20120314-112142".    If	  the	directory   containing
       /var/log is located on the root file system which is initially  mounted
       read-only, then the output will be saved in memory and written out once
       the root file system has been remounted read/write.   To avoid too much
       detail  from  being  written  to the serial console (which could poten‐
       tially slow down the  boot  sequence),  only  print  no	more  than  16
       instances of each type of file system corruption.

	    [options]
		 max_count_problems = 16
		 log_dir = /var/log/e2fsck
		 log_filename = e2fsck-%N.%h.INFO.%D-%T
		 log_dir_wait = true

FILES
       /etc/e2fsck.conf
	      The configuration file for e2fsck(8).

SEE ALSO
       e2fsck(8)

E2fsprogs version 1.42.9	 December 2013			e2fsck.conf(5)
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