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MTREE(5) File Formats Manual MTREE(5) NAME mtree -- format of mtree dir hierarchy files DESCRIPTION The mtree format is a textual format that describes a collection of filesystem objects. Such files are typically used to create or verify directory hierarchies. General Format An mtree file consists of a series of lines, each providing information about a single filesystem object. Leading whitespace is always ig- nored. When encoding file or pathnames, any backslash character or character outside of the 95 printable ASCII characters must be encoded as a back- slash followed by three octal digits. When reading mtree files, any appearance of a backslash followed by three octal digits should be con- verted into the corresponding character. Each line is interpreted independently as one of the following types: Signature The first line of any mtree file must begin with "#mtree". If a file contains any full path entries, the first line should begin with "#mtree v2.0", otherwise, the first line should begin with "#mtree v1.0". Blank Blank lines are ignored. Comment Lines beginning with # are ignored. Special Lines beginning with / are special commands that influence the interpretation of later lines. Relative If the first whitespace-delimited word has no / characters, it is the name of a file in the current directory. Any relative entry that describes a directory changes the cur- rent directory. dot-dot As a special case, a relative entry with the filename .. changes the current directory to the parent directory. Op- tions on dot-dot entries are always ignored. Full If the first whitespace-delimited word has a / character after the first character, it is the pathname of a file relative to the starting directory. There can be multiple full entries describing the same file. Some tools that process mtree files may require that multiple lines de- scribing the same file occur consecutively. It is not permitted for the same file to be mentioned using both a relative and a full file specification. Special commands Two special commands are currently defined: /set This command defines default values for one or more key- words. It is followed on the same line by one or more whitespace-separated keyword definitions. These defini- tions apply to all following files that do not specify a value for that keyword. /unset This command removes any default value set by a previous /set command. It is followed on the same line by one or more keywords separated by whitespace. Keywords After the filename, a full or relative entry consists of zero or more whitespace-separated keyword definitions. Each such definitions con- sists of a key from the following list immediately followed by an '=' sign and a value. Software programs reading mtree files should warn about unrecognized keywords. Currently supported keywords are as follows: cksum The checksum of the file using the default algorithm speci- fied by the cksum(1) utility. contents The full pathname of a file whose contents should be com- pared to the contents of this file. flags The file flags as a symbolic name. See chflags(1) for in- formation on these names. If no flags are to be set the string "none" may be used to override the current default. ignore Ignore any file hierarchy below this file. gid The file group as a numeric value. gname The file group as a symbolic name. md5 The MD5 message digest of the file. md5digest A synonym for md5. sha1 The FIPS 160-1 ("SHA-1") message digest of the file. sha1digest A synonym for sha1. sha256 The FIPS 180-2 ("SHA-256") message digest of the file. sha256digest A synonym for sha256. ripemd160digest The RIPEMD160 message digest of the file. rmd160 A synonym for ripemd160digest. rmd160digest A synonym for ripemd160digest. mode The current file's permissions as a numeric (octal) or sym- bolic value. nlink The number of hard links the file is expected to have. nochange Make sure this file or directory exists but otherwise ig- nore all attributes. uid The file owner as a numeric value. uname The file owner as a symbolic name. size The size, in bytes, of the file. link The file the symbolic link is expected to reference. time The last modification time of the file, in seconds and nanoseconds. The value should include a period character and exactly nine digits after the period. type The type of the file; may be set to any one of the follow- ing: block block special device char character special device dir directory fifo fifo file regular file link symbolic link socket socket SEE ALSO cksum(1), find(1), mtree(8) HISTORY The mtree utility appeared in 4.3BSD-Reno. The MD5 digest capability was added in FreeBSD 2.1, in response to the widespread use of programs which can spoof cksum(1). The SHA-1 and RIPEMD160 digests were added in FreeBSD 4.0, as new attacks have demonstrated weaknesses in MD5. The SHA-256 digest was added in FreeBSD 6.0. Support for file flags was added in FreeBSD 4.0, and mostly comes from NetBSD. The "full" en- try format was added by NetBSD. BUGS The requirement for a "#mtree" signature line is new and not yet widely implemented. FreeBSD 14.3 December 31, 2007 MTREE(5)
NAME | DESCRIPTION | SEE ALSO | HISTORY | BUGS
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