DOKK / manpages / debian 10 / sysvinit-core / runlevel.8.en
RUNLEVEL(8) Linux System Administrator's Manual RUNLEVEL(8)

runlevel -- find the previous and current system runlevel.

runlevel [utmp]

Runlevel reads the system utmp file (typically /var/run/utmp) to locate the runlevel record, and then prints the previous and current system runlevel on its standard output, separated by a single space. If there is no previous system runlevel, the letter N will be printed instead.

If no utmp file exists, and if no runlevel record can be found in the /var/run/runlevel file, runlevel prints the word unknown and exits with an error.

Runlevel can be used in rc scripts as a substitute for the System-V who -r command. However, in newer versions of init(8) this information is also available in the environment variables RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL.

The name of the utmp file to read.

init(8), utmp(5)

Miquel van Smoorenburg, miquels@cistron.nl

May 27, 1997