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Name

chroot - change root directory for a command

Synopsis

/usr/sbin/chroot newroot command

Availability

SUNWcsu

Description

chroot causes command to be executed relative to newroot. The meaning of any initial slashes (/) in the path names is changed to newroot for command and any of its child processes. Upon execution, the initial working directory is newroot.

Notice that redirecting the output of command to a file:

chroot newroot command >x

will create the file x relative to the original root of command, not the new one.

The new root path name is always relative to the current root: even if a chroot is currently in effect, the newroot argument is relative to the current root of the running process.

This command can be run only by the super-user.

Return Values

The exit status of chroot is the return value of command.

Example

chroot provides an easy way to extract tar files written with absolute filenames to a different location.

example# cp /usr/sbin/static/tar /tmp
example# dd if=/dev/nrst0 | chroot /tmp tar xvf -

Note that tar is statically linked, so you do not have to copy any shared libraries to the newroot filesystem.

See Also

cd(1) , chroot(2)

Notes

Exercise extreme caution when referencing device files in the new root file system.

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