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MKFS(8)                      System Administration                     MKFS(8)

NAME
       mkfs - build a Linux filesystem
SYNOPSIS
       mkfs [options] [-t type] [fs-options] device [size]
DESCRIPTION
       mkfs  is  used  to build a Linux filesystem on a device, usually a hard
       disk partition.  The device argument is either the  device  name  (e.g.
       /dev/hda1,  /dev/sdb2),  or  a  regular  file  that  shall  contain the
       filesystem.  The size argument is the number of blocks to be  used  for
       the filesystem.
       The exit code returned by mkfs is 0 on success and 1 on failure.
       In  actuality,  mkfs  is  simply a front-end for the various filesystem
       builders (mkfs.fstype) available under Linux.  The  filesystem-specific
       builder is searched for in a number of directories, like perhaps /sbin,
       /sbin/fs, /sbin/fs.d, /etc/fs, /etc (the precise  list  is  defined  at
       compile  time but at least contains /sbin and /sbin/fs), and finally in
       the directories listed in the PATH environment  variable.   Please  see
       the filesystem-specific builder manual pages for further details.
OPTIONS
       -t, --type type
              Specify  the  type of filesystem to be built.  If not specified,
              the default filesystem type (currently ext2) is used.
       fs-options
              Filesystem-specific options to be passed to the real  filesystem
              builder.   Although  not  guaranteed,  the following options are
              supported by most filesystem builders.
       -V, --verbose
              Produce verbose output, including all  filesystem-specific  com-
              mands  that are executed.  Specifying this option more than once
              inhibits execution of any filesystem-specific commands.  This is
              really only useful for testing.
       -V, --version
              Display  version  information and exit.  (Option -V will display
              version information only when it is the only  parameter,  other-
              wise it will work as --verbose.)
       -h, --help
              Display help and exit.
BUGS
       All  generic  options must precede and not be combined with filesystem-
       specific options.  Some filesystem-specific programs do not support the
       -V  (verbose)  option,  nor  return  meaningful exit codes.  Also, some
       filesystem-specific programs do not  automatically  detect  the  device
       size and require the size parameter to be specified.
AUTHORS
       David Engel (david AT ods.com)
       Fred N. van Kempen (waltje AT uwalt.org)
       Ron Sommeling (sommel AT sci.nl)
       The  manual  page  was shamelessly adapted from Remy Card's version for
       the ext2 filesystem.
SEE ALSO
       fs(5),  badblocks(8),  fsck(8),  mkdosfs(8),  mke2fs(8),   mkfs.bfs(8),
       mkfs.ext2(8), mkfs.ext3(8), mkfs.ext4(8), mkfs.minix(8), mkfs.msdos(8),
       mkfs.vfat(8), mkfs.xfs(8), mkfs.xiafs(8)
AVAILABILITY
       The mkfs command is part of the util-linux  package  and  is  available
       from ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/.

util-linux                         June 2011                           MKFS(8)